The head of the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) has drawn wide criticism after she pledged the union’s support for a radical pro-abortion campaign.
RCM Chief Executive Cathy Warwick is backing a British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) campaign to change the law and allow abortion up to birth for any reason.
In addition to her RCM role, Warwick has been chairman of BPAS since 2014.
Tragic
British midwives were shocked and saddened by the move with around 200 signing a letter to the RCM’s board saying they were not consulted. She is facing calls to resign.
Sally Carson, a midwife from Chester, said: “Midwives are for delivering live babies wherever possible and trying to preserve the lives of those born prematurely. These babies are not tumours that they can just remove.”
Northern Irish midwife Judith Smyth said advocating abortion up to birth is “tragic”, adding “to have my own representative body coming out in support of this extreme view is very disappointing. I know she’s our chief, but there is clearly a conflict of interest. On something as big as this, she should have consulted us.”
These babies are not tumours that they can just remove.
Sally Carson
A survey of British women in 2012 found that just two per cent of women favoured a extension to the current 24-week abortion limit. Almost 60 per cent favoured a reduction in the limit.
Conflict of interest
Cathy Warwick has been a trustee of BPAS, which runs a nationwide chain of abortion clinics, for the last five years. In 2014 she was made Chairman, becoming responsible for its strategy and direction.
The RCM announced that it supports the BPAS campaign in February and this month it amended its policy statement to reflect this.
The BPAS campaign, marketed as ‘We Trust Women’, wants abortion to be completely decriminalised and calls for the removal of two sections of the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act.
Critics were quick to point out the jarring nature of the head of a union for midwives supporting a pro-abortion campaign.
Bitterly ironic
Medical Ethics expert and CEO of the Christian Medical Fellowship Dr Peter Saunders said: “It is bitterly ironic that the RCM, the supposed champion of safe childbirth and antenatal care, should be backing a campaign seeking to legalise the killing of unborn children up until birth.
“It is even more extraordinary that their chief executive, who also chairs BPAS, should be spearheading this initiative without apparently even consulting her membership. It is an extraordinary abuse of power.”
The move was also slammed by Tory MP Fiona Bruce, who is Chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Pro-Life Group:
“To propose abortion up to birth for any reason at all is, I believe, completely out of step both with the society and many of society’s representatives in Parliament. We need to stand against this.”
Not consulted
In February, midwives began circulating a letter under the title ‘Not in Our Name’ saying that the new position was announced “without any consultation” of its membership.
It calls for the board of the RCM to “revoke the College’s support for this agenda” and “develop a position that truly represents the views of its members”.
The letter states: “As Midwives, we work to help not only women but their babies also throughout pregnancy and in childbirth.
“For the organisation that represents us to support the radical position (supported by only a small minority of women) that all protections for unborn children should be removed right through to birth, and without any consultation of us members, we find utterly unacceptable.”