Scotland: Judge dismisses legal challenge against law approving abortions at home

Lady Wise

A judge in the Court of Session rejected the petitioner’s argument that the home was not a permissible “class of place” where terminations could take place and that the decision to approve the home as such a place was contrary to the legal requirement that termination treatment be carried out by a “registered medical practitioner”.

Lady Wise heard that the petitioner, the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), sought judicial review of the decision of the Scottish Ministers to grant an approval in October 2017 in terms of section 1(3) and 1(3A) of the Abortion Act 1967.

The approval, the Abortion Act 1967 (Place for Treatment for the Termination of Pregnancy) (Approval) (Scotland) (2017), was to the effect that the home of a pregnant woman who is undergoing treatment for the purposes of termination of her pregnancy is a class of place where treatment for termination of pregnancy may be carried out, where the pregnant woman has attended a clinic where she has been prescribed mifepristone and misoprostol to be taken for the purposes of termination of her pregnancy, and the pregnant woman has taken mifepristone at that clinic and wants to carry out the treatment at home.

In a written opinion, Lady Wise said: “There are good reasons for considering that a woman’s home, in circumstances where she wants that to be the place for the second stage of the pharmaceutical termination of her pregnancy, will be prima facie suitable for that purpose.”