A FAITH-based organisation has been called out for giving a “disingenuous” response to a “mob” of more than 100 anti-choice protesters demonstrating outside an abortion clinic.
In BBC Radio Scotland interview, Lois McLatchie from Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) refused to say whether she felt it was wrong for 100 people to have gathered outside the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital (QEUH) to demonstrate against abortion.
A protest linked to the 40 Days for Life campaign - which has encompassed almost the entirety of Lent – was held on Sunday.
McLatchie said it was something that “only happened once a year” and argued the vast majority of people who stood outside clinics did so peacefully and were just offering “charitable help”.
She claimed Gillian Mackay’s Safe Access Zones Bill would “censor” people who “silently pray” outside a facility offering abortions, after police told a Catholic woman in England last month that “praying is an offence” before arresting her outside a clinic in Birmingham where a local Public Spaces Protection Order was in place.
Safe access zones passed their final parliamentary hurdle in the Commons last month and will comprehensively become law after receiving Royal Assent.
McLatchie was called out on the radio by pro-choice campaigner Gemma Clark, who had previously put forward a petition to the Scottish Parliament to decriminalise abortion.
Clark said: “I don’t think there’s any both sides in this debate and I’m not surprised to hear such a disingenuous answer about a mob of 100 people picketing a hospital last night.
Brilliant, straight-talking rebuttal of anti-abortion lies from @Gemma_clark14 on BBC Radio Scotland this afternoon! 👏 https://t.co/cSVahs1SwL
— Back Off Scotland (@backoffscotland) April 3, 2023
“It’s completely inappropriate and even if that only happens once a year that is no comfort to people who can be in there taking their child to A&E, having a stillborn, having a miscarriage.
“I’m not surprised to hear this from an ADF representative. The Southern Poverty Law Center categorised this group as a homophobic hate group.
“Let’s be honest about who these people are. We’re talking about highly radicalised, anti-abortion activists who are working for highly funded American organisations. This is about protecting women and vulnerable people.”
ADF describe themselves as a faith-based legal advocacy organisation “defending fundamental freedoms and human dignity”.
McLatchie said she rejected the “serious” allegations made by Clark and claimed the Southern Poverty Law Center were a "discredited" group.
Asked whether she felt it was appropriate to have 100 people protesting outside the QEUH, she told BBC Radio Scotland: “The legislation going through the Scottish Parliament would be much more than banning what would be considered harassment.
“It would tackle even having one person silently, individually praying inside their head outside an abortion facility.
“It’s not a mob, they’re praying. It’s important people have the freedom to pray in their heads.
“What I would agree with Gemma on is I also stand against harassment against women in any circumstance and that’s not what we’re dealing with here. There’s already legislation in place to deal with harassment.
“What we’re talking about here is legislation that would go so far as to put censorship on innocent people offering charitable help.”
Mackay – who will introduce the bill to the Scottish Parliament – said she would be speaking with colleagues in the Scottish Parliament “with a view to progressing my bill at the earliest opportunity”.
In response to calls for the bill to be fast-tracked through Holyrood, First Minister Humza Yousaf told the BBC: “We’re going to do everything we possibly can to bring safe access zones to our abortion clinics as soon as we possibly can.
“I’ll engage very early on with Gillian Mackay in relation to safe access zones but I’ve made it unequivocally clear I am in support of them and I am really disheartened to see those protests take place at a time when women are maybe facing the most traumatic days in their lives. It’s not acceptable.”
