Back Off

For many years anti-abortion groups gathered outside abortion clinics to harass and intimidate women, with the aim of stopping women from getting an abortion. These groups display images of dismembered foetuses, hand out leaflets containing false medical information and film women entering clinics.

Encounters with these groups leaft women feeling intimidated, distressed and, in some cases, too scared to get to their appointment.

Despite clear evidence that the intimidation of women outside abortion clinics was growing, the government maintained that existing powers were sufficient to stop this kind of harassment – we knew that just wasn’t the case and that a national solution was desperately needed.

That’s why we kept pushing for new legislation to introduce safe access zones around clinics. A safe access zone would mean that certain activities could not take place within 150 metres of abortion clinics – ending the harassment of women outside clinics.

After a decade of campaigning, these zones were introduced from 31st October 2024.

This map details anti-abortion activity reported outside clinics in the UK from 2018 onwards. 50 clinics and hospitals in England and Wales were targeted by these groups over the course of 6 years.

The law was passed by Parliament in 2023 and comes into force across England and Wales on 31st October 2024.

The law creates zones with a boundary 150 metres from the boundary of any abortion clinic or hospital which provides abortion services where certain activity cannot take place. The banned activity is anything which does, or reasonable could:

• Influence someone’s decision to access or provide abortion services
• Obstruct or impede access to abortion services
• Cause harassment, alarm or distress related to abortion to anybody accessing or providing abortion services

Anybody who is undertaking this action within a safe access zone is committing an offence. They can be arrested, prosecuted, and given an unlimited fine by the courts.