A 74-year-old woman has become the first person to be charged under Scotland’s new abortion buffer zones law. The quiet, unthreatening pensioner was handcuffed and detained under new rules that came into force late last year, setting a 200-metre zone around abortion clinics in which “protests”—including silent prayer—are not allowed.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance specifically mentioned this law in his Munich speech last Friday, highlighting it as an example of the European “enemy within.”
At the time, Britain’s mainstream politicians and newspapers were quick to dismiss the claim that private prayer within people’s own homes was banned inside the ‘buffer zone,’ saying the legislation actually only covered actions causing “harassment, alarm or distress” to others. This wasn’t exactly a gotcha response, given that actions within private homes could still fall under the ban if they were seen or heard by others.
As such, the Alliance Defending Freedom legal advocacy group suggests that simply “having a conversation about abortion in your OWN HOME while the windows are open” could now be a criminal offencse in Scotland.
Much of the press has also been fairly tight-lipped about what the pensioner was actually doing before the time of her arrest. Scottish Greens MSP Gillian Mackay, who introduced the bill, described the protest as “utterly shameful.” But footage shared online by the Scottish Family Party reveals that the woman was in fact standing quietly—perhaps even silently—while holding a sign which read: “Coercion is a crime, here to talk, only if you want.”
Those who break the new anti-free-speech law can be fined up to £10,000 (€12,000), or an unlimited amount in more serious cases, in whatever way these are determined.
