Senior Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg has launched an astonishing attack on abortion rights in the UK, calling the process a “cult of death”.
The ex-cabinet minister said it was “wrong” for the government to allow abortion – and did not agree the right should be protected even in cases of rape or incest.
MPs and campaigners reacted with horror to his remarks – calling them “dangerous” and “grotesque”.
Speaking in a Westminster Hall debate on a petition for abortion to be included in a new Bill of Rights, Mr Rees-Mogg said the number of abortions was a “modern tragedy”.
Asked by Labour’s Stella Creasy if he supported the right of women to choose to an abortion if they a victim of rape or incest, the Tory MP said: “I think the destruction of life is wrong.”
“I do not believe that we should say that a new life should be destroyed. I do not believe that that is the right of the state,” said the former business secretary.
Mr Rees-Mogg added: “This is about destroying life. This is the cult of death. It is the great tragedy of abortion, and it is considered normal.
“The extraordinarily high number of babies that are destroyed is something that should sadden us all to the depths of our souls.”
Ms Creasy later said his views showed why abortion rights had to be better protected in UK law. “Women deserve equal rights. Whoever is in government.”
“If you think we don’t need to codify in law that women have a human right to choose to have an abortion, Jacob Rees-Mogg just argued against women who are victims of rape or incest having a right to have one,” the MP tweeted.
Green MSP Gilliam Mackay said Mr Rees-Mogg’s remarks were “grotesque” and “dangerous”, adding: “Abortion rights are human rights. We cannot allow them be threatened or eroded by reactionary politicians like Mogg.”
The petition debated by MPs urged the government to outline and protect abortion rights in the proposed Bill of Rights, following the landmark US Supreme Court decision which overturned ‘Roe vs. Wade’ rights in the US earlier this year.
Justice minister Edward Argar said the government believed abortion rights should be “settled by legislatures” based on existing laws, since the issue was devolved to Scotland and Northern Ireland.
