The supreme court has ruled that women from Northern Ireland are not entitled to free access to abortions on the NHS, a decision that was condemned by campaigners as a “further blow to women” from the region.

A panel of supreme court judges narrowly upheld an earlier judgment, confirming that women who travel to England from Northern Ireland, which has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe, cannot receive free abortion care on the NHS.

More than 700 women from Northern Ireland who needed abortions last year came to get treatment in England, all of whom would have had to pay between £400 and £2,000 to have the procedure performed privately because of the ban on NHS-funded abortion care for women from the region. The health secretary has a policy of not funding medical services in England that would be unlawful if received in Northern Ireland.

The judges were ruling on the case of a woman identified only as A, who was 15 and resident in Northern Ireland when she became pregnant in 2012. Unable to access abortion services in Northern Ireland, she travelled to Manchester with her mother, and used the services of a private clinic, at a total cost of £900 including travel.

This was a large sum for the family to find, and they were only able to afford treatment because of financial support from the charity Abortion Support Network.

Although the health secretary has accepted that it is within his power to arrange for abortion services to be provided to women from Northern Ireland through the NHS in England, he has refused to exercise that power, the daughter’s lawyer Angela Jackman, of law firm Simpson Millar, said. The girl and her mother brought proceedings for a judicial review, claiming that his refusal was unlawful. Their claim was dismissed by the high court and the appeal court and now the supreme court has upheld that outcome.

But campaigners were encouragedby divisions between the five judges on the panel. Lord Kerr and Lady Hale, the two most senior members of the court, found that the current policy unjustifiably breaches women’s rights under article 14 (freedom from discrimination) and article 8 (right to private and family life) of the European convention on human rights.

In a statement, the woman, known as A and who is now 20, and her mother said: “We are really encouraged that two of the judges found in our favour and all of the judges were sympathetic to A’s situation.” They said they would take the case to the European court of human rights in Strasbourg, in their ongoing attempt “to protect the human rights of the many other women who make the lonely journey to England every week because they are denied access to basic healthcare services in their own country.”.

Jackman, who has represented A and her mother throughout, said: “We are not stopping here.” The case demonstrated the importance of the European court of human rights, she said, “as our most senior judges are almost split down the middle on whether there has been a human rights breach or not on such a vital issue”.

She added: “The time is ripe to seek further redress for the women of Northern Ireland who have such limited reproductive rights.”



Grainne Teggart, from Amnesty International in Northern Ireland, said: “This is a further blow to women from Northern Ireland, who already face some of the harshest abortion laws in Europe. As ever, it is the most marginalised women who will be worst affected.”

Mara Clarke, the founder of the Abortion Support Network, said: “We are disappointed that the court has decided to maintain the status quo for those in Northern Ireland who travel to access a safe, legal abortion, upholding the two-tiered system through which those with money can travel to England and those without can continue unwanted or non-viable pregnancies, risk prosecution by taking safe but illegal early medical abortion pills sourced online, or do more dangerous things in an attempt to self harm.”



Martha Spurrier, the director of Liberty, said: “The UK government can and must take a stand against laws which criminalise abortion. Will ministers continue to turn a blind eye to the suffering caused by these antiquated laws or will they challenge their DUP [Democratic Unionist party] partners and push for a change supported by the majority of Northern Ireland’s population?”