Protesters in summer 2023 demanding decriminalisation of abortion. Loredana Sangiuliano/ShutterstockLegal protection of abortion rights in England and Wales is fragile. Abortion has popular support and is readily available on the NHS, but has also generated a series of criminal investigations. Nicola Packer is one of the most recent abortion-seekers facing criminalisation rather than care. She was found innocent in May after a five year ordeal.Amid concerns about investigations for illegal abortions, MPs may vote on June 17 on legislative action to decriminalise abortion. Political opinion is divided, however, on how to do it. In the absence of a broader push for the kind of inquiries that produced full decriminalisation in Northern Ireland in 2019, MPs will consider two different legal proposals: NC1 and NC20.In England and Wales, people do not have explicit abortion rights as a matter of domestic law. They may feel that they have when they get good abortion care. But as a matter of law, abortion is only permissible under the Abortion Act 1967 if two conditions are met. Two doctors must approve, and the case must meet the legal grounds outlined in the act. These are that there must be a risk to health up to 24 weeks gestation or, after 24 weeks, a risk to life, a risk of grave permanent injury to health or a serious foetal anomaly.If these conditions are not met, then someone who voluntarily ends a pregnancy could be criminally liable. This is because old criminal provisions against abortion – under the Offences against the Person Act 1861 and the Infant Life (Preservation) Act 1929 – are still on the books.Each of the two amendments being put forward would decriminalise abortion by amending a government bill that is already making its way through parliament, the crime and policing bill, rather than by adopting a standalone piece of legislation for abortion.The two amendmentsNC1, proposed by Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi, is for a partial decriminalisation that would entail the “removal of women from the criminal law related to abortion”. This would put a stop to criminal investigations of women and pregnant people on suspicion of abortion, and mean that abortion-seekers no longer face the possibility of prosecution. The proposed amendment has the support of over 130 MPs, has been negotiated with and has the backing of abortion providers, including the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (Bpas), MSI Reproductive Choices and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. But it would not repeal or remove the existing criminal law. The criminal offences in the Offences against the Person Act and the Infant Life (Preservation) Act would remain in place.Neither would abortion providers, or those who assist or support abortion-seekers, including friends and family buying abortion pills on the internet, be exempted from criminal liability.NC20, the second amendment, is for full decriminalisation and is proposed by MP Stella Creasy. It has the support of over 100 MPs, but apparently not the support of abortion providers according to Bpas. Creasy’s proposal is more complex and wider in scope. This amendment would fully decriminalise abortion by repealing the criminal provisions altogether. It would maintain the Abortion Act 1967 as the legal framework for abortion care, so the legal grounds for abortion would remain the same. The proposed amendments to decriminalise abortion come after several high-profile cases. Brizmaker/Shutterstock Most importantly, this amendment aims to make abortion a human right, and protect the law from being restricted in the future. It does this by requiring that the secretary of state apply to England and Wales the human rights recommendations that led to decriminalisation in Northern Ireland. These are outlined in a 2018 UN report on the elimination of discrimination against women.The report’s recommendations establish full decriminalisation as a baseline standard that must be achieved. They also require minimum legal standards of allowing abortion in cases where there is a risk to health, where the pregnancy results from rape, and in cases of severe foetal anomaly. The Abortion Act 1967 already delivers these standards. But the recommendations – and Creasy’s proposed amendment – would set out a framework that could be applied in the future to other questions around bodily autonomy.No change in the law will happen immediately after the vote as the crime and policing bill has several more stages to pass in parliament. But the debate should give observers an indication of the direction of travel when it comes to the future of reproductive rights in England and Wales.Ruth Fletcher is Chairperson of the Abortion Support Network.