In the memorable first transformation scene depicted in Robert Louis Stephenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Doctor Jekyll recalls, “within, I was conscious of a heady recklessness…a solution of the bonds of obligation, an unknown but not innocent freedom of the soul…I stretched out my hands, exulting in the freshness of these sensations; and in the act, I was suddenly aware that I had lost in stature…”
A similar transformation took place on Tuesday this week in the House of Commons. An overwhelming majority of our members of parliament voted to decriminalise abortion up to birth, at least for abortion self-inflicted by the mother, with no in-person medical presence.
