The Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform UK, which has compared abortion to the Holocaust, is behind the campaign in Walthamstow – and the Advertising Standards Agency says there is nothing it can do about it.
Speaking exclusively to The Independent, Labour MP Stella Creasy said the leaflets “shocked” and “distressed” her constituents. She has raised concerns that the leaflets showing an image of an embryo are misleading. “Children and women who experienced miscarriage picked them up,” she added. “There have to be ways in which we protect people’s personal spaces.”
Ms Creasy, a vocal campaigner on abortion rights, said more than 100 local residents have been in touch after receiving leaflets – with some saying they were challenged by the pamphlet distributors after questioning them.
Ms Creasy said that while anti-abortion activists have the right to campaign, they should not be leafleting people’s homes. She condemned the distribution as a personal attack on herself and “an attempt to distress my local constituents to deter them from voting for me”.
Ms Creasy is one of a group of cross-party MPs putting forward an amendment to the government’s Criminal Justice Bill, which is expected to be voted on in the Commons on 4 June. The amendment would decriminalise abortion during the current time limit of 24 weeks and safeguard medics who help provide terminations.
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