Belfast abortion clinic closure '˜a victory for the unborn'

The organisation has announced that it will shut its facility this Friday, something described by DUP MLA Jim Wells – who held the health post during 2014 and 2015 – as a source of “delight”.

Marie Stopes said its decision had been spurred on by the government’s recent move to fund the cost of procedures for Northern Irish women who travel across the Irish Sea to have terminations.

It said it will now “focus its resources so that Northern Irish women can better access funded treatment in England”.

Marie Stopes, a registered charity in England and Wales, opened its Belfast clinic in October 2012, sparking a wave of protest.

It has always said it would provide abortions only according to Northern Ireland’s existing, relatively strict laws.

As to why it opened the clinic at all, given that the NHS already offers abortions under the same laws, a spokesperson said: “We opened our Belfast clinic in 2012, at a time when many women in Northern Ireland – and even some GPs – were not even aware of the legal options.

“For the last five years, our Belfast team has provided the services allowed within a highly restrictive legal framework and worked tirelessly to drive awareness of women’s options.

“We’re proud that by having a presence in the city, we’ve been instrumental in moving the debate on.”

Under Northern Irish law, abortions can happen only if the life or wellbeing of the mother is under threat. The procedure can be done up to roughly nine weeks’ gestation.

The 1967 Abortion Act greatly liberalised access to terminations in Great Britain, but did not extend to Northern Ireland.

Mr Wells said the chances of him ever supporting an extension of the 1967 act to Northern Ireland are akin to seeing “Elvis on the back of the Loch Ness monster accompanied by Lord and Lady Lucan”.

Regarding the clinic’s closure, he said: “I’m very, very pleased this has happened.

“It has brought a great deal of pleasure and delight to the pro-life lobby, of which I proudly regard myself as a member.

“Because there has been so much bad news in this field in recent months and years, that at times it’s difficult to keep the enthusiasm going.

“Now we’re in a situation where there’s some good news at last.”

He believed factors behind the closure are a “lack of custom”, “peaceful, legitimate protests outside”, plus a “general distaste for abortion in Northern Ireland”.

He added that the issue of abortion should “handled by the health trusts in Northern Ireland who are totally accountable to the Assembly and to parliament ... Marie Stopes is accountable to nobody”.

He also said the clinic was “deliberately” placed across the road from Great Victoria Street train station, where the Dublin train comes in, to appeal to women from the Republic of Ireland.

Mr Wells said that he had struggled to obtain data relating to the number of people using the clinic when he had sat on the justice committee at Stormont.

When asked by the News Letter how many terminations the Belfast clinic facilitates each year, a Marie Stopes spokesperson said it is “currently only supporting between six and seven abortion clients per month, a fraction of the number of women seeking abortion”.

They could not say if this figure had changed significantly over time.

The number of abortions in NHS hospitals in Northern Ireland in recent years has been in the low single figures.

However, a great many more women travel from the Province to Great Britain for abortions each year.

Roughly 450 of them use Marie Stopes’ own clinics in England for abortions annually.

The charity indicated that roughly three-quarters of these people arrange such trips by phone or online, rather than via the Belfast clinic.

Marie Stopes was founded as an organisation in 1976. It is named after Scotswoman Marie Stopes, whom the organisation said founded “the UK’s first static family planning centre” in the 1920s.

Today it works to “provide contraception and safe abortion”. It works both in the developed world, as well as in underdeveloped countries.

It opened its centre in Belfast in October 18, 2012, drawing immediate protests.

At its helm was Dawn Purvis, the former leader of the UVF-linked PUP, who said many of the people opposing the centre’s arrival “don’t think that women should have control over their own sexual and reproductive health and be able to determine for themselves when and how many children to have”.

The News Letter reported at the time that it would offer “terminations at a cost of £450 as well as a range of sexual and reproductive services – including short and long-term contraceptive options, emergency contraception and HIV testing”.

It would provide only non-surgical abortions, such as those carried out by drugs.