ASN Emergency Appeal

[annwfyn]

Abortion Support Network (ASN) is an all-volunteer charity that provides accommodation, financial assistance and confidential, non-judgemental information to women forced to travel from Ireland and pay privately for abortions in England. I saw this on faerierhona's LJ, and post it here for any who haven't seen it.

Here is their appeal released today:

Dear Supporters

Today we were planning to send out information about our upcoming 2nd 'birthday', something cute with a play on the theme on our 2nd anniversary, along with the formal invitation to our party on 26th October (with special guest speaker Diane Abbott MP!!).

Instead, we have to send out an emergency fundraising appeal.

ASN has £175 in the bank and the following four women need our help. Without additional funds, we will only be able to help one of them.

A 30 year old mother of one who was extremely distressed to learn that she was pregnant. She recently lost her job, is facing eviction from her home and her family is currently going through another crisis which means that she has little financial or emotional support.

A young teen whose mother called us on her daughter's behalf. Struggling to make ends meet on benefits and already behind with the rent, they borrowed what money they could for a procedure. When they arrived in England they found out that the pregnancy was further along than they'd thought. As there was no doctor at the clinic to do the later procedure, they've had to return home and do not have the funds for the combined costs of a more expensive abortion procedure + new flights. With nowhere else to turn they called ASN.

A woman in her 30s with a late term pregnancy who has just one week left to access a safe and legal abortion. Having recently broke up from her long-term partner and giving up work to care for a sick family member, she has no way of finding the money she needs. She called ASN after having to put her appointment on hold because suddenly a friend who was going to lend
her the money she needed changed their mind "for moral reasons". Unable to get a loan from a bank or to turn elsewhere for support she desperately needs help to meet the costs of her expensive late-term procedure.

A 29 year old mother of three, who recovering from postnatal depression following her last pregnancy and trying to return to education said ?she simply can't do it again "for me or my children." With both herself and her partner both out of work they're trying really hard to scrape and save the money they need for her procedure.

Huge thanks to the phone volunteer on duty this week for having to navigate this very emotive situation.

Can you help? Help can come in the form of a single donation, a standing order, or a direct debit [www.abortionsupport.org.uk]. If you can't help with a donation, you can help by forwarding this email to your prochoice friends, family and colleagues, tweeting the appeal, and posting it on Facebook.

We are 4 days from turning 2. With your help, we will still be able to say that ASN has never turned down a woman unable to access an abortion without our help.

Thank you for your continued support.

Mara

Mara Clarke, Director
Abortion Support Network
+44 (0) 7897 611 593
mara@abortionsupport.org.uk
www.abortionsupport.org.uk
Charity Number 1142120

Comments

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

~tilts head~

Wow?

[suchid.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's surprising to me.

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

Why?

[suchid.livejournal.com]

I'm familiar with Charities giving advice and support but not so familiar with Charities basically holding one's hand all the way through.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

Do you mean abortion charities? Because an awful lot of health charities do - I mean, that's kind of the point of Marie Curie nurses, for example, who are there to provide hands on support for cancer patients to the point of death. Certainly, the Huntingdon's Disease Foundation also offers the same kind of support to families who suffer from Huntingdon's Disease, offering advice, advocacy with benefits tribunals, counseling, running summer camps and basically just trying to be there.

[suchid.livejournal.com]

I do mean abortion charities.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

I guess it's kind of different to an abortion charity offering support to women in the UK because women over here have the legal right to abortion and so don't need the practical help just to access such.

[suchid.livejournal.com]

Without getting into whether it's right that Ireland doesn't allow abortions; there's something unsettling to me about an organisation existing to help an individual procure something they cannot legally obtain in their country of origin, regardless of what that something is.

[sea-of-flame.livejournal.com]

To my understanding, there's nothing legally stopping those with the personal funds to do so coming over to the UK for abortions - which makes this an issue of class/economics, rather than law/ethics.

[suchid.livejournal.com]

Emotive imagery aside I believe it is similar to assisting someone to go to Dignitas in Switzerland.

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

To be honest, what the women we help think is the most important thing to me. Not the morals of others.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

I believe it is established in Irish law that it is not legal to prevent a woman travelling to the UK to gain an abortion. This seems to imply that the law there accepts the right of a woman to travel for an abortion which differs notably from the Dignitas situation.

[suchid.livejournal.com]

My understanding is that it is permissible for women from the Republic to travel to the UK to gain an abortion but not in Northern Ireland.

[sea-of-flame.livejournal.com]

What about the legal response on re-entry?

Like suchid, I was drawn to comparisons with the Dignitas scenario (procedure legal in country it occurs, travel is involved, country from which patient comes deems it an illegal practice) - I don't believe UK authorities would try to stop someone travelling to Switzerland, but they have been known to at least investigate relatives viewed to have travelled with them/assisted them, /after/ they returned...

As far as I know there isn't an attitude of investigating/prosecuting on return, but I'm not 100% sure!

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

No, there isn't. We have a lot of people come over from NI without issue, the only thing we have to do is not talk to them about abortion when they are in a family planning clinic, although the FPCs will refer them to us.

[sea-of-flame.livejournal.com]

*nods* That's what I thought, but I wanted to be sure.

Simple, charitable, levelling the playing field, so that those without the personal funds/support can have the same practical options that those with the funds/support already have to start with.

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

I don't think you can talk about that without getting into the ethics of abortion. I mean, would you be equally against an organisation that brought Saudi women over here to learn to drive, or to train as judges? Both of those things would be illegal in their home country.

The problem with saying that we must respect other countries' laws is that some of those laws are discriminatory, counterproductive, or plain abhorrent. And if we respect them to the extent that we refuse aid we are capable of giving to those living there who ask us for help - those who want freedoms we regard as normal and essential, but are denied them through a mere accident of geography - then we are not only condoning but actively upholding laws that we know are wrong.

Are there any limits to the laws you would uphold? Would you, for example, insist that someone who had criticised the Burmese government had to stay in Burma under house arrest for several years? Would you heartily disapprove of a UK corporation publishing their views on the grounds that those views were illegal in Burma?

If so, I would regard that as repugnant in the extreme. If not, then you're already exercising your own ethical views in that area, and can come off your high horse about this particular issue :)

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

Well, we do. Not everyone needs that level of support from us, some just need advice. But for many, what we do is necessary.