Abortion policy and politics on the Lane Committee of Enquiry, 1971-1974.

Abstract

The 1967 Abortion Act did not quell public discussion on therapeutic abortions in Britain. Criticism of the way the Act was working began almost as soon as the legislation came into force. After only three years, a committee of enquiry, chaired by Justice Elizabeth Lane, studied the working of the Act. This Committee caused some surprise on all sides of the abortion debate by offering unanimous support for the Act in its original form. Understanding how the Lane Committee arrived at its unexpected recommendations is important not only because the Report has proved to be an enduring endorsement of the Act but also because the Lane Committee provides a case study of the process of policy formulation at the level of a committee of enquiry. The Lane Committee appears to have achieved consensus incrementally. First a majority and then the whole Committee supported the Act as a humane measure requiring regulatory and not legislative solutions to the problems of its working. Using both written and oral sources, I will argue that consensus evolved through the compelling leadership of several key members of the majority group with particular influence by the most psychosocially oriented members of the Committee.