Academy Of Ideas

Following the vote in the House of Lords to approve the decriminalisation of women who have abortions after the legal limit of 24 weeks, the whole issue of abortion itself has once again become highly contested. In that context, this debate – recorded at the Battle of Ideas festival 2025 on Saturday 18 October – is very topical.  ORIGINAL FESTIVAL INTRODUCTION Since 2020, the Academy of Ideas has published Letters on Liberty – a radical pamphlet series aimed at reimagining arguments for freedom today and inspiring rowdy, good-natured disagreement. In her Letter – Abortion and the Freedom to Forge Our Own Fate – Ann Furedi, an author and former chief executive of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, argues that debates about abortion often focus on when human life begins in the womb. Instead, she argues that it is important to consider a different human life – that of the woman. Furedi argues that the future of a woman’s pregnancy should be for her alone to decide, and this decision ought to be regarded as