A small group have gathered in the main square in the centre of Birmingham, and it’s a real mix of people. There are older figures from the community, young students, as well as groups of friends and some families.
On closer inspection, you can make out candles and rosary beads, signalling it’s some kind of vigil. As hymns start to be sung, it’s revealed to be a gathering to protest against abortion.
Nearly 90% of this country is pro-choice, but a small, vocal minority is becoming more organised in the UK.
Energised by the Trump administration, young and old activists in the UK anti-abortion movement have become more motivated to get their message across.
And all this is happening just as abortion laws in the UK could be about to go through the most significant change in over 50 years.
Pro-choice campaigners (left) at London’s High Court in July 2023 and a pro-life demonstration (right) outside parliament in May 2024. Pic: Reuters/PA
Nearly three years on from the ruling reversing Roe v Wade – a landmark case that once made abortion legal in the US – the age-old abortion debate has become even more political in the UK.
A breakthrough moment came when Vice President JD Vance criticised the UK laws on abortion buffer zones – areas outside clinics where police are allowed to use their discretion to stop anyone harassing women entering abortion clinics.
Explained: What are the UK’s abortion laws?
One of the cases cited by the vice president was that of Isabel Vaughan-Spruce.
She’s a lifelong anti-abortion activist who has been handing out leaflets outside clinics for 20 years. Since buffer zones came into force, she now visits to silently pray once a week. In 2022, she was arrested outside an abortion clinic for silent prayer and taken to court, although the charges were later dropped.
She also received £13,000 in a civil claim against West Midlands Police, which did not admit liability.
“They actually asked me what I was doing, and I said, well, I’m just physically standing here. I might be praying in my head, but nothing out loud. And on that basis, they made an arrest. I was heavily searched, I was taken to the police station, locked in a police cell for hours before being questioned under caution. And then, eventually, I went to court.
“I believe that abortion centres are like the modern-day Calvary. This is where the innocent are being put to death. I might not be physically interacting with anybody or stopping anyone or talking to anyone, just to be there in prayer is really, really important from a spiritual perspective.”
Isabel Vaughan-Spruce, an anti-abortion activist, was arrested by police near an abortion clinic, although charges were later dropped
For people like Ailish McEntee, any type of protest is a distraction, which she says is not wanted by the women who come to the clinic she works at in London. She’s hoping that this week MPs will go further on abortion laws and pass an amendment through the Commons to decriminalise abortion for anyone seeking an abortion up to 24 weeks.
“The law itself works very well for the majority of people, but for those individuals in those kind of really high-risk domestic abuse situations… they maybe can’t make it to a clinic, they might seek abortion care from those kind of unregulated providers.
“So this amendment would take away that decriminalisation of women themselves. And it’s a really strange part of the law that we have.
“I think particularly in recent years, with Roe v Wade overturning and Donald Trump winning the election again, I think it’s really pushed forward the anti-choice rhetoric that has always been there, but it’s absolutely ramping up.”
Ailish McEntee works at an abortion provider and wants to see a change in the law
According to polling by Sky News and YouGov, 55% of people are in favour of the law changing to stop women being criminalised for their own abortion before 24 weeks.
Surprisingly though, 22% said they believe women should be investigated or imprisoned for abortion after 24 weeks.
Stella Creasy is one of the MPs laying down an amendment to try to decriminalise abortion.
“There’s no other health care provision that we see with a criminal foundation in this way and it has a very real practical consequence.
“We’ve seen some incredibly vulnerable women and girls who didn’t even know that they were pregnant who have late-term miscarriages finding themselves with police officers rather than counsellors at their hospital beds finding themselves under suspicion for months, if not years, and I just don’t think that’s where the British public are at.”
Labour MP, Stella Creasy, hopes her amendment will see abortion decriminalised
But Rachel is concerned by this amendment. She runs sessions at the UK arm of Rachel’s Vineyard – a faith-based organisation originally founded in the United States, dedicated to, in their words, “healing the trauma of abortion”. They frame abortion not as a medical procedure, but as a harm to mothers and fathers.
“With all sudden deaths, whether you are 80 years of age or you’re 26 weeks born, you know, out of the womb, and you’ve died, you’ve sadly died, we need to be able to investigate that. For us to have compassion, we need to have justice.”
Rachel Mackenzie runs sessions at a faith-based organisation and is worried about any reforms to current abortion legislation
In Northern Ireland, where the decriminalisation battle was won in 2019, I met Emma, who fought on the campaign at Alliance for Choice.
She says police searches were a daily routine for her, and since 2019, she has been able to continue helping women navigate abortion care without the threat of being investigated.
Emma Campbell helps women navigate abortion care in Northern Ireland, where decriminalisation was secured in 2019
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Orfhlaith Campbell should have been one of the lucky ones. She was able to seek a medical abortion at 23 weeks in Northern Ireland, two years after it had been decriminalised, but she says she had to fight to get the care she needed.
She was on the cusp of the medical time limit when she suffered a premature rupture of membranes, went into labour and was told she would likely develop sepsis.
Orfhlaith Campbell, who had an abortion at 23 weeks in Northern Ireland, says she had to fight to get the care she needed
“I would have died and my daughter was dying, I could feel her dying, and it was a compassionate choice. When we got the post-mortem after, the infection had went into her wee body too, and she had nuclear debris in her lungs. If she had survived at all, it would have been a very, very painful existence.
“So yes, I had to break through the stigma that had been ingrained in me in Northern Ireland. I had to break through legal fights and the barriers that were being put in place. But I was strong enough to know that that was compassionate and that healthcare was needed both for me and her.”
The UK is majority pro-choice, and our polling shows the majority are for decriminalising abortion.
But activists who are against abortion are energised by the changing landscape of the debate in the US.
As parliament sets to vote on two amendments on abortion laws this week and potentially pulls in one direction, activists will likely only get louder and become more effective at getting their message across.
