We Need a Rational Approach to the Abortion Debate

The arguments in favour of examining the workings of the Abortion Act are far too important to be left to the Catholic church. For, on the evidence of recent pronouncements, the British hierarchy is unwilling to set out the moral imperatives that should determine policy on the subject. On the BBC's Today programme last week, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the Archbishop of Westminster, kept repeating that public opinion supported the view that the 24-week limit on legal termination should be revised. And the Most Reverend Peter Smith, Archbishop of Cardiff, claimed that pictures of a foetus apparently "walking in the womb" had "touched people's hearts". The date on which an unborn child can be destroyed is not a matter that can be decided by popular suffrage. It is a question of right and wrong.

Humanists should fill the moral vacuum. We put respect for human life at the heart of our creed and we pride ourselves in pursuing that central tenet of belief with uncompromising logic rather than reliance on mysticism or magic. The rules that should govern an ethically acceptable policy on abortion are not difficult to define. Metaphysics aside, it is reasonable to conclude that the new human being begins when the foetus is capable of independent life. Before that, an abortion is undesirable but tolerable. After that, it is only acceptable in the most extreme cases. They do not include the psychological trauma of the expectant mother. A civilised society does not kill one person in order to alleviate the distress of another, no matter how traumatic it may be.

That incontrovertible imperative leaves parliament and government with only one task to perform: discovering when independent life is viable. Over the past 20 years, medical science has increased its ability to cure or alleviate almost every known disease. And improved standards of living have contributed to undeniable improvements in health and longevity. It is very nearly inconceivable that the healthy development of the foetus is the one area that has remained at the level it had achieved when the working of the Abortion Act was last examined. That makes an irresistible case for re-examining the question of when we should allow life to be extinguished. Indeed the arguments in favour of a re-examination are so compelling that the opponents of an inquiry regularly ignore them.

Melissa Dear of the Family Planning Association argues that further study is not necessary because "only a small minority of women have an abortion after 20 weeks ... and for those there are good reasons". One of those reasons is, in her estimation, the fact that the prospective mothers "may not have realised that they were pregnant". How can that possibly be a justification for killing a potential, or an actual, human being?

The other day, as part of a radio discussion, a young lady raised the question of a child conceived by rape. Surely, she said, no one could argue against an abortion - no matter how late the date - in such circumstances. The logic of her argument is as disturbing as her lack of respect for life. I give her credit for not demanding the execution of the rapist. If she does not propose capital punishment for the perpetrator of the horrible crime, how can she justify the death penalty for one of its victims? The rational conclusion is desperately hard on the woman who has been violated. But unless the preservation of life comes first, we are savages.

No doubt the two archbishops claimed the support of public opinion because they did not want the argument about abortion to be polarised between the Protestant and Catholic churches. One of the attractions of Rome used to be its moral certainty - the absolute refusal to temper its argument according to the needs of good public relations. Last week it failed to make its case even when its beliefs could be supported by reason. The rational - I will not presume to call it the moral - argument about abortion is, I know, dismissed by some sections of society as primitive misogyny. But when they write their letters of complaint, note how many of them are prepared to deal with the central issues: when does independent life begin, and should we alter the date at which, in any circumstances, it is ended? If they fail to answer those questions, we will know for sure how strong was the case that the two archbishops failed to advance.