I was abroad during the week in which Cardinal O'Brien delivered his sermon on the 40th anniversary of the passing of the Abortion Act and so was unable to respond in my capacity as sponsor of the original bill, nor would I have wished to do so without reading - as I have now done - the full text of his pronouncements.

Keith Patrick O'Brien is a good man whose views on many issues I have shared, and I have always applauded his contribution to the great improvement in inter-church relations in Scotland.

The views of the Roman Catholic Church on abortion have always been fundamentally at odds with those of both parliament and people generally.

But in my view he is perfectly entitled to expect those of his flock who are politicians to adhere to their doctrines, especially on issues where are free votes on matters of conscience: so I do not join in criticism of that part of his sermon, and it is certainly not for me as a mere elder in the Church of Scotland to comment on whatever disciplinary sanction he proposes.

However, there were two of his statements to which I take strong exception.

He said first "we were told lies and misinformation masquerading as compassion and truth".

By whom? The passage of the bill through both Houses took 18 months of detailed debate and scrutiny supported by the British Medical Association, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the Royal College of Psychiatrists and others.

It was opposed by some distinguished dissenters such as Professors Ian Donald in Glasgow and Hugh McLaren in Birmingham. Any lies or misinformation would have been readily exposed.

Most of the Bishops in the Lords voted in support, following what was the most influential 70-page report "Abortion - an ethical discussion" from an Anglican Church committee which I know also greatly influenced the Church of Scotland and the Methodist Church in their positive responses.

Sadly this is no longer in print but I quoted its defining statement: "It cannot be maintained that the absolutist' position has ever commanded, or commands now, general acceptance in the Christian conscience."

It went on to argue a balance between weighing the claims of the foetus to develop against the claims of wellbeing of the mother.

Debate was not limited to the public arena. I accepted two invitations to private meetings in the then Catholic seminary at Melrose in my constituency where I was received with great courtesy as "Daniel in the lions' den" and where we engaged in intense discussion. Again any lies or misrepresentation would not have passed.

Indeed it was as a direct result of those meetings - with mutual respect of our irreconcilable positions - that I accepted to amend the bill to include a conscience clause protecting any doctor or nurse from participation in abortion services on grounds of conscience.

My second objection to what the Cardinal said was thankfully not in the sermon itself but in an unfortunate remark during a press conference where he referred to the numbers of abortion as "the equivalent of two Dunblane massacres a day".

Knowing that the majority does not share his Church's views, he surely would not face the parents of children gunned down in that horror and tell them they had just suffered the same experience as an abortion.

I can agree with the Cardinal when he claimed that the act has sometimes been abused (what act isn't - but do we suggest repealing for example the Road Traffic Acts?), that there are too many abortions (but his truthful answer to the question of how many would be acceptable would have to be zero), and that "for many women abortion has become an alternative form of birth control" (though that is a bit rich considering his Church's objection to other birth control methods!).

My principal defence of the Abortion Act lies in the knowledge that recorded abortions in the UK run annually at a slightly lower level than those in neighbouring Catholic France, Spain and Italy, and are just over half the recorded rate in the United States of America where the subject is one of constant controversy.

Last year's award winning film Vera Drake informed our younger citizens of what happened before the 1967 act. The actual numbers of abortion were not known because they were not recorded. Abortion was not invented by the act.

We do know that between 30 and 50 women died every year in the UK as a result of self-induced or criminal abortion. The public wards of every hospital contained patients admitted under the heading of "septic or incomplete abortion". Such cases are never seen today.

We also know from the World Health Organisation report of 2004 that nearly 200 women still die every day from unsafe abortions in the under-developed world - none now in Britain.

If termination has to happen it is better to be legal and safe than illegal and dangerous. There can be no "correct" number of abortions in Britain - every one is the lesser of two evils and has to be judged "in good faith" by the medical profession.

In his retiring lecture as General Secretary of the BMA in 1992, Dr John Marks said: "Looking back over the years it seems to me that the event which has had the most beneficial effect on public health was the passage of the Abortion Bill."

The Cardinal understandably focuses on the destroyed foetuses: millions of women will prefer to say a quiet "amen" to Dr Marks.

Lord Steel of Aikwood is former leader of the Liberal Party and was responsible for steering through the Private Members Bill that reformed the law on abortion.


By LORD STEEL