Abortion Bill — 23 Oct 2018 at 12:49

The majority of MPs voted to decriminalise all abortions in England, Wales and Northern Ireland performed with the consent of the pregnant women up to the twenty-forth week of pregnancy.

The motion supported by the majority of MPs in this vote was:

  • That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the law relating to abortion in England and Wales, and Northern Ireland;
  • to remove criminal liability in respect of abortion performed with the consent of the pregnant woman up to the twenty-fourth week of pregnancy;
  • to repeal sections 59 and 60 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861;
  • to create offences of termination of a pregnancy after its twenty-fourth week and non-consensual termination of a pregnancy;
  • to amend the law relating to conscientious objection to participation in abortion treatment;
  • and for connected purposes.

The provisions of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 referenced criminalise: "Procuring drugs, &c. to cause abortion" and "Concealing the birth of a child".

The text of the Bill had not been published at the time of the vote[2] so MPs were voting on the basis of the motion text.

At the time of the vote the 1967 Abortion Act, as amended[3], permitted abortions in England and Wales if two registered medical practitioners are of the opinion, formed in good faith—

  • (a)that the pregnancy has not exceeded its twenty-fourth week and that the continuance of the pregnancy would involve risk, greater than if the pregnancy were terminated, of injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman or any existing children of her family; or
  • (b)that the termination is necessary to prevent grave permanent injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman; or
  • (c)that the continuance of the pregnancy would involve risk to the life of the pregnant woman, greater than if the pregnancy were terminated; or
  • (d)that there is a substantial risk that if the child were born it would suffer from such physical or mental abnormalities as to be seriously handicapped.

The proposed bill would apply to Northern Ireland where at the time of the vote the Infant Life (Preservation) Act 1929 only permitted abortion to preserve the life of the mother

Debate in Parliament |

Public Whip is run as a free not-for-profit service. If you'd like to support us, please consider switching your (UK) electricity and/or gas to Octopus Energy or tip us via Ko-Fi.

Party Summary

Votes by party, red entries are votes against the majority for that party.

What is Tell? '+1 tell' means that in addition one member of that party was a teller for that division lobby.

What are Boths? An MP can vote both aye and no in the same division. The boths page explains this.

What is Turnout? This is measured against the total membership of the party at the time of the vote.

PartyMajority (Aye)Minority (No)BothTurnout
Con15 108 (+1 tell)039.2%
DUP0 7 (+1 tell)080.0%
Green1 00100.0%
Independent3 0042.9%
Lab178 (+2 tell) 6172.8%
LDem5 1050.0%
PC4 00100.0%
SNP1 105.7%
Total:207 123152.2%

Rebel Voters - sorted by vote

MPs for which their vote in this division differed from the majority vote of their party. You can see all votes in this division, or every eligible MP who could have voted in this division

Sort by: Name | Constituency | Party | Vote

NameConstituencyPartyVote
Heidi AllenSouth Cambridgeshirewhilst Con (front bench)aye
Victoria AtkinsLouth and HorncastleCon (front bench)aye
Crispin BluntReigateConaye
Tracey CrouchChatham and AylesfordCon (front bench)aye
Caroline DinenageGosportCon (front bench)aye
James DuddridgeRochford and Southend EastCon (front bench)aye
Justine GreeningPutneywhilst Conaye
Jo JohnsonOrpingtonCon (front bench)aye
Tim LoughtonEast Worthing and ShorehamCon (front bench)aye
Huw MerrimanBexhill and BattleCon (front bench)aye
Penny MordauntPortsmouth NorthCon (front bench)aye
Daniel PoulterCentral Suffolk and North IpswichCon (front bench)aye
Chris SkidmoreKingswoodCon (front bench)aye
Anna SoubryBroxtowewhilst Conaye
Sarah WollastonTotneswhilst Con (front bench)aye
Tim FarronWestmorland and LonsdaleLDem (front bench)no
Mary GlindonNorth TynesideLab (minister)no
John GroganKeighleyLab (minister)no
Helen JonesWarrington NorthLab (minister)no
Mike KaneWythenshawe and Sale EastLab (minister)no
Rachael MaskellYork CentralLab (minister)no
Fiona OnasanyaPeterboroughwhilst Lab (front bench)no
Teresa PearceErith and ThamesmeadLab (minister)both

About the Project

The Public Whip is a not-for-profit, open source website created in 2003 by Francis Irving and Julian Todd and now run by Bairwell Ltd.

The Whip on the Web

Help keep PublicWhip alive