We've defended reproductive rights from religiously motivated restrictions since our founding.
Religion should not stand in the way of reproductive healthcare.
A desire to restrict reproductive rights, and to control women's bodies, is a hallmark of religious fundamentalism. We strongly support the right of women to have legal and safe abortions and access to emergency contraception.
Since its founding the National Secular Society has supported reproductive rights. In 1878 our founder and vice-president were prosecuted for making information about birth control accessible to working class women.
Throughout the world, reproductive rights are still under threat from theocrats. While individual religious people hold diverse views on abortion, every stage of progress in reproductive healthcare has been fought by religious organisations. Often these have involved virulent campaigns of intimidation and misinformation.
84% of people in the UK believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases. This includes 76% of religious people and 94% of nonreligious people.
In the UK, emergency contraception can still sometimes be difficult to obtain. Some religious pharmacists have defied General Pharmaceutical Council guidance by refusing to sell it or even to dispense a prescription given to a woman after a consultation with her own doctor.
People of all religions and beliefs can have disagreements on the boundaries of bodily autonomy and reproductive rights. However, religious beliefs should not be used to restrict the bodily autonomy of other people.
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Latest updates
Huge gulf between Catholics and Church leaders over social issues, survey finds
Posted: Mon, 6 Jul 2015 15:33
A survey of Catholics in England and Wales has found a very large gap between their views and the teachings of the church on gay marriage, contraception and divorce.
The survey, conducted by A Call To Action (ACTA), which is a Catholic group that calls for "an end to rule-book driven policies on the family and sex", found strong dissent on several key aspects of Vatican teaching.
85% of respondents reject the Catholic Church's prohibition on contraception and 88% object to "refusing access to the sacraments for the divorced and remarried."
A significant majority (55%) disagreed with the Vatican over same-sex marriage and 84% agreed with the statement "Love is love, whether it is heterosexual or homosexual. We could learn a lot from homosexual couples."
94% wanted the Church to be more welcoming of same-sex couples, single parents and divorced people.
The survey found that, across a wide range of social issues, Catholics have a far more tolerant and socially liberal outlook than that espoused by senior Church leaders.
The report will be circulated by ACTA to all Catholic Bishops in England and Wales.
An NSS spokesperson commented: "When Catholic leaders try to influence social policy according to religious doctrine, they should bear in mind that a large number of their own followers disagree with the official line, as the Church found with their crushing defeat in the recent referendum on marriage equality in Ireland.
"Equally, politicians should be wary of assuming that religious leaders are actually representative of views within their faith."
While the sample size was relatively small, other polling and surveys in the past have found a similar dissonance between the views of ordinary Catholics and the doctrinal teachings of the Vatican.
A recent survey of young American Catholics, by Catholics For Choice, found strong support for the belief that it should be illegal for Catholic institutions like churches and schools to discriminate on the basis of an employee's sexual orientation or support for abortion rights.
Additionally, 82% of respondents to the Catholics For Choice survey believe that abortion should be legal in "at least some circumstances" and 69% agreed that same-sex marriage should be legal in "all states".
Secular Medical Forum warns that new Conscientious Objection Bill threatens provision of patient care
Posted: Thu, 18 Jun 2015 11:11
Secular doctors have voiced serious concerns about the Conscientious Objection (Medical Activities) Bill, which had its first reading in the House of Lords on 4th June 2015.
The legislation would greatly expand the existing provision which allows for staff to opt-out of involvement in procedures such as the termination of a pregnancy. Under the new law, the opt-out would include "any supervision, delegation, planning or supporting of staff" involved in abortions or "the withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment."
Dr Antony Lempert, a practising GP and chair of the Secular Medical Forum, commented: "Conscientious objection to the active participation in the ending of someone's life or performing an abortion is fairly uncontroversial. However, patients must not be left in a position whereby the doctor is abandoning them because they have chosen a particular reasonable, legal treatment option.
"Patients making informed treatment choices should be supported by healthcare professionals whether or not their beliefs and values are shared.
"The risk is that granting doctors and nurses wider freedoms to withdraw from providing care risks compromising the provision of care; this is something we have seen in other countries such as Italy where some patients have been unable to access abortion services."
Dr Lempert expressed his concerns that the bill appears to undermine a Supreme Court judgment from December 2014 in which two midwives seeking an exemption from any abortion-related activity were advised that, whilst they did not need to participate in any aspect of the abortion itself, their professional responsibilities did extend to wider roles such as the supervision of nursing colleagues.
The legislation could potentially encompass medical staff even tangentially "participating in" abortion or the withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment.
The Secular Medical Forum have warned that the proposed bill could even result in doctors and nurses withdrawing from providing treatment to "vulnerable patients who have different beliefs and values."
"Doctors and nurses choose our professions; patients don't choose to need our professional expertise," he said. "Healthcare professionals should take responsibility for choosing a suitable role that will not bring their own beliefs into conflict with the care they are expected to provide to patients. Where there is conflict, doctors may need to set aside their own personal beliefs in order to provide care as specified in GMC guidance for doctors."
The legislation was proposed by Baroness Nuala O'Loan, and came 22nd in the ballot of Private Members' Bills. In 2014, Baroness O'Loan quit the British Medical Association's medical ethics committee because of the organisation's support for extending abortion rights to Northern Ireland. She said at the time: "I believe in the sanctity and sacredness of human life, so I could not commit to anything inconsistent with that position".
NSS campaigns manager Stephen Evans commented: "There is a balance between recognising the legitimate conscientious objection of medical practitioners directly involved in procedures, and providing safe and comprehensive access to healthcare.
"We fear that this Bill, if it gets through the significant parliamentary hurdles in its way, would upset that balance drastically, and allow for an inappropriately wide exemption- covering people who are at the very periphery of these services. This would clearly have a damaging effect on patients' access to healthcare."
The Second reading of the Bill is yet to be scheduled.
