Wera Hobhouse MP: Reform UK is importing America’s abortion culture war into Britain

Wera Hobhouse is the Liberal Democrat MP for Bath

Abortion has always involved deeply-held personal, ethical and religious beliefs. But for decades there has been a broad political consensus in the UK that decisions about pregnancy belong to women, their families and their healthcare providers, not politicians looking for a new culture war battleground. That non-partisan consensus is now under pressure.

Recent reporting has revealed a growing effort by Reform UK figures, anti-abortion campaigners and far-right activists to make abortion a new frontier in Britain’s culture wars. The language is becoming increasingly familiar: inflammatory rhetoric, misinformation, moral panic and attempts to portray established reproductive rights as somehow radical or extreme.

We should not dismiss this as political noise. Many people look at what has happened in the United States and assume it could never happen here. They point to our different political traditions and our strong public support for abortion rights.

But rights are rarely lost overnight. More often, they are gradually politicised before they are challenged.

The rollback of abortion rights in America did not begin with the overturning of Roe v. Wade. It began years earlier, with a deliberate effort to make reproductive rights a political dividing line. Issues that had previously been treated as matters of healthcare or personal opinion became tools in a broader political ideological campaign. That should serve as a warning.

Only recently, Parliament voted overwhelmingly to decriminalise abortion for women in England and Wales – the biggest step forward for reproductive rights in six decades. I was proud to support that change. The reform was not about expanding access to abortion or changing time limits, it simply recognised that women should not face criminal investigation, prosecution or imprisonment because of circumstances surrounding their own pregnancies.

Since 2020, around 100 women have been investigated by police following pregnancy loss or suspected abortion offences. Some investigations involved women who had suffered miscarriages. Six women faced court proceedings and one woman was imprisoned under legislation rooted in the Victorian-era Offences Against the Person Act 1861. No woman experiencing pregnancy loss should have to fear becoming the subject of a traumatic criminal investigation.

Yet even before decriminalisation has had time to take effect, there are already calls from some Reform UK figures and their allies to reverse it.

What worries me is not simply disagreement over policy – healthy democracies will always contain disagreement – it is the deliberate attempt to import the tactics and language of America’s abortion wars into British politics.

Open Democracy reported that the UK arm of The Alliance Defending Freedom, an organisation closely associated with anti-abortion campaigning in the United States, has received more than £2 million in funding from its American parent organisation while campaigning against abortion clinic safe access zones.

Its analysis also found a significant increase in abortion-related content among Reform-linked and far-right social media accounts over the past two years. These posts generated hundreds of thousands of interactions and frequently relied on inflammatory language designed to provoke outrage rather than inform debate.

The objective is not simply to oppose abortion, it is to make reproductive freedom politically toxic again. Once that happens, rights that once seemed secure become negotiable. The lesson we need to learn from America is that complacency can be dangerous. 

That does not mean every disagreement about abortion is an attack on women’s rights, nor does it mean Britain is on the verge of following America’s path where 17 states enforce near-total bans. But it does mean we should be alert when politicians seek to reopen settled questions, import foreign culture wars, and turn women’s bodies into political battlegrounds.

One of the most striking features of this debate is how far it appears to be driven from the top down, rather than from public demand.

Polling consistently shows overwhelming support for access to abortion in the UK, including among Reform voters. In fact, around 86% of Reform voters support a woman’s right to choose. The public understands that these are deeply personal decisions. They understand that criminalising women does not solve difficult situations. They understand that healthcare works best when it is guided by evidence, compassion and clinical expertise, rather than political ideology.

That raises an obvious question: if this is the settled view of the electorate, why is it being reopened as a political battleground at all?

The answer lies in the growing influence of a small but organised network of politicians, media figures and campaigning groups who have made abortion a central cultural and ideological cause.

Open Democracy reported that Paul Marshall, the co-owner of GB News, which has paid Nigel Farage nearly £370,000 since he became an MP, is on the board of the anti-abortion ARC forum alongside JD Vance’s “intellectual mentor” James Orr and Reform MP Danny Kruger. Farage has himself spoken at events in the United States where restrictions on abortion were being promoted, and has previously described the UK’s 24-week time limit as  “ludicrous”.

None of this reflects a clear public mandate to change the law. Instead, it reflects a process of political agenda-setting in which minority positions are amplified through social media platforms and transatlantic alliances until they begin to appear more mainstream than they are.

Rights are not usually removed in a single dramatic moment. They are eroded gradually through the normalisation of once-fringe arguments, the reshaping of political debate, and the steady expansion of what is considered reasonable to question.

That process is already clearly underway. We should have the awareness to say so, and the vigilance to ensure it goes no further.