Heidi Stewart, the chief executive of Bpas, the UK’s leading provider of abortion services, said safe zones - buffer areas of 150 metres around abortion clinics designed to stop women being harassed with leaflets, shown pictures of foetuses, or having to pass by vigils - were vital to protect women’s access to essential healthcare in an “overwhelmingly pro-choice country”.
The Labour MP Stella Creasy, who campaigned for the safe zones which were introduced last year, posted a picture of a scene from the dystopian television series The Handmaid’s Tale alongside with the words: “And so it begins … ” She accused Vance of calling “for the right to harass women having an abortion” because “our bodies are their battleground, our human rights their target”.
The Abortion Services (Safe Access Zones) (Scotland) act, introduced last year, banned “silent prayer” to prevent mass silent vigils which have been used by large groups of US pro-life protesters such as 40 Days for Life.
The US vice-president’s criticisms of UK and Scottish policies on safe access zones around abortion clinics -part of a wide-ranging tirade against Europe on Friday - were derided as inaccurate and misogynistic by a number of groups, politicians and governments.
Smith-Connor, who is receiving legal support from Alliance Defending Freedom International, a conservative Christian legal advocacy group in the US - was convicted of breaching a safe zone in October last year after refusing repeated requests to move away from outside an abortion clinic in Bournemouth in November 2022.
