“An appalling affront to the proper rights and responsibilities of parents. It undermines the values of family life”: that’s how Archbishop Peter Smith, chairman of the Department of Christian Responsibility and Citizenship of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, comments on the decision of a British health worker in Nottinghamshire, in northern England, “to refer a 14-year-old child to doctors with a view to having an abortion without the knowledge or consent of the mother”. According to British law, teachers are not obliged to inform parents if one of their pupils is pregnant. After having taken the first of the two abortion pills, the girl told everything to her mother Maureen, and together they decided to keep the child, but by then it was too late. “As a mother I felt wholly deprived of my rights”, declared Maureen. Her words are echoed by Archbishop Smith, according to whom the decision taken by Melissa’s teachers “undermines the values of family life and in particular the rights of parents to nurture, guide and at times properly make decisions in the best interests of their children. It also promotes a culture of irresponsibility in respect of sexual relationships between young people who are under-age”. The archbishop also emphasized that the law in this area is unclear: “On the one hand, parents are held responsible for truancy by their children… On the other, the proper rights of parents to guide and support a child in this very grave matter of abortion, have been completely removed”.
