Abortion: My right to know
A MOTHER launched a landmark legal battle yesterday for every parent’s right to know if their daughters are being secretly advised about having abortions.
Susan Axon challenged a ‘ horrifying’ government policy that allows girls under 16 to terminate a pregnancy without their mother or father knowing.
In a case that has implications for families across the country, she single- handedly pitched the role of decent, caring parents against a child’s entitlement to medical confidentiality.
It represents a direct challenge to Health Department guidelines on the issue, and exposes what one family organisation called the ‘mixed messages’ the Government is sending out to parents about their role in bringing up children.
But any ruling in Mrs Axon’s favour could prevent doctors from giving even the simplest sexual advice in confidence to teenagers, family planning groups warned.
They also fear that removing confidentiality will prevent teenagers seeking professional advice on sexual matters, with ‘disastrous consequences’.
Current guidelines allow doctors, schools and medical staff to advise teenagers privately on abortion, contraception and sexually transmitted diseases.
Mrs Axon’s crusade against what she called a ‘culture of secrecy’ was inspired by the case of 14- year- old Melissa Smith, who had an abortion arranged by her school. Yesterday the 51-year- old divorced mother of five argued it was ‘absolutely crazy’ that her 13-year- old daughter Amber’s school needed permission to give her a headache tablet yet could guide her into having a secret abortion without any parental involvement.
One of the country’s leading judges will decide if the guidelines – which also cover advice on contraception and sexually transmitted diseases – are lawful, or should be quashed.
Mrs Axon went to the High Court in London to complain that the guidelines were undermining her role as a parent.
She has three sons aged 27, 24 and 18 and two daughters aged 16 and 13. She won legal aid to bring the civil case after a long struggle.
It was a parent’s right, she argued, to help their teenage children through the ‘ tumultuous years’ of growing up.
At the moment, she said, government policy excluded her from that
vital process, and kept parents ‘in the
dark’ about what was happening to
their children.
Beneath the legal majesty of an oakpanelled courtroom, in a sea of legal
wigs and gowns, the mother from
Withenshawe, Manchester, outlined
her case against Health Secretary
Patricia Hewitt.
She also spoke courageously of how
her own experience of abortion two
decades ago had left her mentally
scarred.
Outside court she added: ‘I think it’s
absolutely outrageous that they even
think they can get away with it behind
our backs.
‘ A lot of abortion providers are making a lot of money out of young girls. It’s
not just about my daughters – I’ve got
sons as well. It’s about my grandchildren, and everybody’s grandchildren.’
In court Mrs Axon’s counsel
Philip Havers QC told Mr Justice
Silber the case raised the question of
whether the parent of a child under 16
who goes to her doctor for advice and
treatment about contraception,
sexually transmitted infections, or
abortion ‘ are entitled at least to be
told about the proposed advice and
treatment before it is provided’.
Today lawyers are expected to
explain why the guidelines were intro- duced in July 2004, and defend government policy.
Philip Sales, for the Health Secretary, will argue that Mrs Axon’s ‘right to know’ demand has no basis in law.
In a written argument before the court, he maintains that her submissions amount to a radical departure from long established medical practice. Her challenge was simply a vehicle to attack the Government’s teen pregnancy strategy, he says.
The guidelines, introduced in 2004, replaced earlier government advice that followed a legal challenge in the mid- 1980s by campaigning Roman Catholic mother Victoria Gillick over prescribing the Pill to under-16s.
The House of Lords ruled in 1986 that doctors and health professionals were justified in giving contraceptive advice and treatment without parental knowledge or consent, provided certain conditions were met.
Mrs Axon argues that the guidance ‘ misinterprets and subverts’ the Gillick ruling, and is therefore unlawful.
The Family Planning Association is opposing the case. Chief executive Anne Weyman said: ‘ Young people worry a great deal about confidentiality and it is the single most important factor in their decision to visit a health service.
‘Compulsory parental notification of their visit will drive teenagers away from services and prevent many of them coming forward for help.’
Mrs Axon claims the guidelines infringe her parental rights under the European Convention on Human Rights. The Government says that patient confidentiality is a right protected under the same law.
‘I believe that it is especially at this time that as a parent, I should be involved in helping my daughters make wise decisions.
‘ Inevitably this may involve discussing difficult issues on which we disagree, or matters they would prefer I was not aware of.
‘ For example, a negative report from school as to academic progress, or as to behaviour, or peer group concerns, would be talked about.
‘ The difficult discussions, however, strengthen our family life – and, I trust, equip my daughters with resolve and wisdom in the choices that they make.
‘ Discussions and decisions relating to sex are no different, the consequences of unwise decisions potentially staying with you for the rest of your life.
‘I believe the guidance represents a direct attack on my rights as a parent, as the prime nurturer of my children, by introducing a third party into the family, whose advice may result in my daughter receiving contraceptives and an abortion without my knowledge, involvement or support.
‘ The Government should be encouraging family cohesion, not undermining it.
‘ I find the prospect that my daughters could be receiving contraception and an abortion w i t h o u t my k n o w l e d g e horrifying.
‘ Apart from encouraging an unacceptable sexual philosophy upon my children, I believe the prospect of them going through such a significant operation as an abortion without discussing it with me, and without my support, would be harmful to their welfare. I cannot understand how a doctor could consider such an operation to be in their best interests without even consulting me, when an understanding of the child’s family context and values would be a significant factor in helping the child come through the trauma of either abortion or teenage pregnancy.
knowing.’
‘ Nor can I understand how effective aftercare could be provided in such a culture of secrecy.
‘It is incongruous to me that I am required to consent to my daughter having her belly-button pierced while she can have an abortion without me even MELISSA Smith was only 14 when she had an abortion in April last year.
By the time her mother Maureen found out she was pregnant, Melissa, who had been advised by a school health worker, had already taken the first of two ‘ chemical abortion’ pills.
Although she changed her mind about the termination, it was too late.
Six months later, Melissa became pregnant again by her 15- year- old boyfriend Dwain Smith.
She was 15 when she gave birth to a son in July after a 12-hour labour.
Melissa’s abortion had been arranged for her after she said she was too frightened to confide in her 38-year- old mother and stepfather.
She approached Claire Chapman, an outreach health worker at Brunts School in Mansfield.
Miss Chapman advised her to see two doctors who authorised a termination.
When Mrs Smith was finally told what was going on, Melissa decided she wanted to keep the baby.
But the termination process was already underway. Mrs Smith, a senior care worker, claims the secret termination breached her human rights. When Melissa became pregnant again, her mother said she had been ‘ hell-bent’ on replacing the baby she lost.
‘ Had she been given the time to think and discuss her pregnancy with me back then, it would have been a very different story – and this time it is,’ she said.