Campaigners draw up battle lines as Parliament prepares to debate abortion

BY MARK GREAVES
CAMPAIGNERS are preparing for a historic battle to amend the abortion laws during the passage of the Human Tissue and Embryos Bill this autumn.
Pro-life MPs and charities have joined forces to distribute a "toolkit" across the country that will guide people on how to lobby their MPs.
The toolkit is aimed at mobilising grassroots activists to put pressure on MPs before they return to Parliament.
Pro-choice groups. however, plan to use an international conference in London as a platform to campaign for abortion restrictions to be scrapped.
The Global Safe Abortion Conference, organised by Marie Stopes International, will be held in October just days before the 40th anniversary of the Abortion Act.
It will be used to call on MPs to allow nurses or midwives to carry out some abortions, and to drop the requirement to have two doctors' signatures.
Pro-choice campaigners say the conference is a "seminal event and a call to action" that will "move forward" the domestic abortion agenda.
Josephine Quintavalle of Alive and Kicking, an alliance of pro-life charities and Christian groups, called the event "an overt political gesture" — and said it signalled the alarm of the pro-choice lobby.
"They are at last realising that, contrary to the position they are taking, the country is much more favourable to our position, which is to reduce the number of abortions." she told the Guardian.
"People are horrified when they hear how the figures continue to rise."
The Human Tissue and Embryos Bill opens up the abortion laws to possible amendments for the first time since 1990.
It will be introduced by the Government in the Queen's Speech in November and deals with a wide range of issues, including whether scientists should be allowed to create hybrid human-animal embryos.
The Bill could be used to lower the time-limit for abortion from 24 weeks. Advances in medicine mean that a quarter of babies aborted at 24 weeks can now survive.
The focus on abortion is likely to intensify at the end of October, when the Commons science and technology committee is due to publish Parliament's first-ever report on the subject.
The committee is to examine the impact of the latest scientific developments on abortion law — but has ruled out any consideration of ethics.
Jim Dobbin, Labour MP for Heywood and Middleton and chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Pro-Life Group, urged constituents to use the toolkit to question their MPs.
"As Parliament is currently in recess," he said, "it is a fantastic time to question your MP's voting intentions on this Bill and to relay the information back to the All-Party Group so that we can plan our Parliamentary campaign effec Phyllis Bowman, director of Right to Life, said: "The biggest cross-section of prolife groups ever in the UK have come together with the All Party Parliamentary ProLife Group for a mass lobby of MPs on the Human USW and Embryos Bill.
"It is vital that people use the toolkit to ensure that MPs are informed and that we know how they will vote."
She added: "This is not the time for mass .mailings — this is the time for individual lobbying of MPs."
Meanwhile, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority was expected to announce this week whether it would allow scientists to create human-animal embryos.
Its decision will be reviewed by MPs during the passage of the Human Tissue and Embryos Bill.
One scientist, Dr Stephen Minger, said he thought it was "practical" to use cows' eggs instead of human eggs because slaughtered cows would provide a constant supply of eggs.
The Commons science and technology committee has backed the use of hybrid cells.