Woman fights for parents' right to know abortion advice to under 16s

A mother of two teenage daughters went to the High Court in London last week to challenge government guidance allowing doctors to provide abortion advice or contraception to young people under 16 in England without the knowledge of their parents.

Judgment is pending in the judicial review case brought by Sue Axon, 51, a divorced single mother of five children from Manchester, over Department of Health guidelines issued last year that, she says, “undermine the role of parents.”

The case has echoes of the controversy two decades ago when Victoria Gillick unsuccessfully claimed that parents should have …