[The demand that women must have the right…]

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The demand that women must have the right to control their own fertility, and to decide for themselves when, or whether to have children must be the starting point for any fight for adequate abortion and contraceptive care.

Only then will women have the basis for making decisions which vitally determine what kind of life they lead.

Nevertheless, despite huge gains in the development of contraceptive techniques and the limited legalisation of abortion, women in this country do not, at present, have this basic right to decide about their fertility.

The questions of abortion and contraception are necessarily interrelated.

For working class women in the 19th century the oniy method of birth control apart from withdrawal, was abortion. Contraceptives, though used by the middle class, were too expensive for workers on' subsistence wages, and abortion, though hazardous, did at least enable the women to take the decision whether or not to continue with a pregnancy.

Today, when contraceptives are more reliable, and more readily available, they are by no means wholly safe or wholly effective. Many women prefer to use a cap, with abortion as a back up if necessary, to using the potentially dangerous Pill or IUD.

Many other women are unable for medical reasons to use the Pill or IUD, and even those who do cannot guarantee they will be free from an unwanted pregnancy.

Abortion, though an unsatisfactory method of fertility control, is nevertheless crucially important.

Right to choose

Yet neither abortion nor contraception are freely available to women. Throughout the anti-Corrie campaign, many peopie must 'have got the impression that if Corrie was defeated, women would have the right to choose on abortion.

However, this is far from the case. The 1967 Act gives the decision to the doctor; and even his/her decision is limited by the constraints and the necessity to justify termination by considerations about the health of the woman or the foetus.

This means that anti-abortion GPs can, and do, refuse to give consent to many women who need abortion. Further, in areas such as Birmingham, anti-abortion consultant gynaecologists refuse permission for any but 'medically necessary' abortions-forcing women to use private and charity clinics or the backstreets.

The NHS does not help alien women who come from countries with • reactionary abortion legislation. Thus Irish women, who come to England for the abortions they are refused at home have to pay for private medical care.

Nor is contraception freely available.

• In some, but not all health districts, supplies from Family Planning Clinics are free of charge. However these clinics, which generally provide an understanding and helpful service, are themselves facing cuts and closures.

Hence contraceptive care and advice. is increasingly becoming the work of GPs and, as with abortion, reactionary GPs can create difficulties for women, especially for under 16s seeking contraceptives.

As if this were not bad enough, abortion and contraceptive services are likely to deteriorate, rather than improve.

Although Corrie's . vicious private member's bill was defeated, Tory MP Stewart who came second in the ballot, may press ahead with attempts to restrict the 1967 Act, either