Tom Hunt was the Conservative MP for Ipswich from 2019 to 2024.
I remember very well the day I voted against against division 237 of the Health and Care Bill. During the pandemic, the Government brought in ‘pills by post’ for abortions as a temporary measure, the idea being that it would be phased out once the pandemic came to an end.
I’d opposed pills by post (‘DIY abortions’) from the word go, and had hoped the deeply unsatisfactory practice would only be around for a very limited time.
I was therefore deeply alarmed when I discovered that a backbench amendment had been tabled to the Health and Care Bill in March 2022 to put pills by post abortions onto a permanent footing.
Ordinarily, votes on matters relating to abortions are free votes, the idea being that MPs are allowed to vote with their conscience and there is no “whipping” by political parties – just as with the recent vote on whether to legalise assisted suicide.
On this occasion, I and a number of other MPs believed that the vote on whether or not to make pills by post permanent should be treated differently, due to the significant concerns many of us had regarding the safeguarding of women. At the time I spoke to several pro-abortion MPs who felt the same way and who ended up voting against division 237 of the Health and Care Bill.
Alas, while a decision was taken by the Government (Conservative) whips not to whip the vote, the opposition (Labour) whips appeared to adopt the reverse position. While they did not formally whip this vote, we were led to believe that they had done so informally. Evidence of this informal whipping is evident from the fact that only a handful of Labour MP voted against division 237 despite there being a number of Labour MPs who had concerns about the policy.
Regarding my concern about safeguarding women, I wish I had been proven wrong, but a tragic case that has come to public prominence this week at Norwich Crown Court vindicates all 188 current and former MPs who voted against division 237 of the Health and Care Bill on 30 March 2022.
In late October this year, Stuart Worby was found guilty of spiking a woman’s orange juice and inserting a number of abortion pills inside the woman under the guise of “kinky sex”. These pills were provided in 2022 by the Gynae Centre, one of the largest private abortion providers in the country, under the pills by post service; the Court heard that Worby acquired the pills via an associate who asked his partner to order them.
The devastating consequence of this is that the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, ended up in hospital where she had a miscarriage 15 weeks into her pregnancy. The woman in question wanted to have her baby, and if it were not for this horrendous act, there is every chance the baby would be alive and well today.
Last Friday, Worby was sentenced to 12 years in prison for his crime. The reality is that if it had not been for the vote on 30 March 2022, it would have been almost impossible for this tragedy to have happened.
Without the legalisation of pills by post, an unwanted abortion – that is, an abortion inflicting on a woman by an abusive partner – could not have taken place in this shocking way. Before the pills by post service, the first set of abortion pills had to be taken in a medical environment, overseen by medical professionals.
Another depressing aspect of this case is that it is likely it is the tip of the iceberg. For every tragic case that ends up in the public domain, there will doubtless be many more that never see the light of day: women who have been the victims of abusive relationships and forced into abortions they did not want through coercive control.
This is precisely why so many of my former colleagues saw this as not simply an abortion issue, but an issue around how we best safeguard women, and why one of the last things I did in Parliament as an MP was to sign an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill tabled by Flick Drummond that sought to reinstate in-person appointments before abortion pills could be prescribed to women.
This cross-party amendment was signed by 51 other MPs at the time but sadly came to nothing due to the general election.
It is critical that MPs within the current Parliament put aside their views on abortion per se and look at the facts when it comes to pills by post and women’s safeguarding. They should look at this tragic case and do the right thing: consign pills by post to history.
Tom Hunt was the Conservative MP for Ipswich from 2019 to 2024.
I remember very well the day I voted against against division 237 of the Health and Care Bill. During the pandemic, the Government brought in ‘pills by post’ for abortions as a temporary measure, the idea being that it would be phased out once the pandemic came to an end.
I’d opposed pills by post (‘DIY abortions’) from the word go, and had hoped the deeply unsatisfactory practice would only be around for a very limited time.
I was therefore deeply alarmed when I discovered that a backbench amendment had been tabled to the Health and Care Bill in March 2022 to put pills by post abortions onto a permanent footing.
Ordinarily, votes on matters relating to abortions are free votes, the idea being that MPs are allowed to vote with their conscience and there is no “whipping” by political parties – just as with the recent vote on whether to legalise assisted suicide.
On this occasion, I and a number of other MPs believed that the vote on whether or not to make pills by post permanent should be treated differently, due to the significant concerns many of us had regarding the safeguarding of women. At the time I spoke to several pro-abortion MPs who felt the same way and who ended up voting against division 237 of the Health and Care Bill.
Alas, while a decision was taken by the Government (Conservative) whips not to whip the vote, the opposition (Labour) whips appeared to adopt the reverse position. While they did not formally whip this vote, we were led to believe that they had done so informally. Evidence of this informal whipping is evident from the fact that only a handful of Labour MP voted against division 237 despite there being a number of Labour MPs who had concerns about the policy.
Regarding my concern about safeguarding women, I wish I had been proven wrong, but a tragic case that has come to public prominence this week at Norwich Crown Court vindicates all 188 current and former MPs who voted against division 237 of the Health and Care Bill on 30 March 2022.
In late October this year, Stuart Worby was found guilty of spiking a woman’s orange juice and inserting a number of abortion pills inside the woman under the guise of “kinky sex”. These pills were provided in 2022 by the Gynae Centre, one of the largest private abortion providers in the country, under the pills by post service; the Court heard that Worby acquired the pills via an associate who asked his partner to order them.
The devastating consequence of this is that the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, ended up in hospital where she had a miscarriage 15 weeks into her pregnancy. The woman in question wanted to have her baby, and if it were not for this horrendous act, there is every chance the baby would be alive and well today.
Last Friday, Worby was sentenced to 12 years in prison for his crime. The reality is that if it had not been for the vote on 30 March 2022, it would have been almost impossible for this tragedy to have happened.
Without the legalisation of pills by post, an unwanted abortion – that is, an abortion inflicting on a woman by an abusive partner – could not have taken place in this shocking way. Before the pills by post service, the first set of abortion pills had to be taken in a medical environment, overseen by medical professionals.
Another depressing aspect of this case is that it is likely it is the tip of the iceberg. For every tragic case that ends up in the public domain, there will doubtless be many more that never see the light of day: women who have been the victims of abusive relationships and forced into abortions they did not want through coercive control.
This is precisely why so many of my former colleagues saw this as not simply an abortion issue, but an issue around how we best safeguard women, and why one of the last things I did in Parliament as an MP was to sign an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill tabled by Flick Drummond that sought to reinstate in-person appointments before abortion pills could be prescribed to women.
This cross-party amendment was signed by 51 other MPs at the time but sadly came to nothing due to the general election.
It is critical that MPs within the current Parliament put aside their views on abortion per se and look at the facts when it comes to pills by post and women’s safeguarding. They should look at this tragic case and do the right thing: consign pills by post to history.