Listening to the “Today” programme on Radio 4 this morning, their main, after the 8am news, item was that old abortion law issue. There was a quite interesting scientific bloke, then the usual, inevitable interview subject.

Why DO producers get Catholic church representatives on to talk about abortion? You get the predictable middle-aged single bloke, saying all of the predictable things, representing a tiny fraction of the British community.

There may be a case from lowering the abortion law limit from 24 weeks to 23 or 22, if foetuses are indeed viable at that stage – but the only people who can really set out the case are the medical experts. And of course the people running with this are just anti-abortionists (i.e. pro-coathangerists) grabbing whatever angle on the story they think might help their case.

And if the limit is lowered, then almost all of the abortions that will be stopped will be those of grossly disabled foetuses that women will then have to carry for another three months or so, knowing what they carry. Not something I’d like to do.

While I’m venting my spleen, you do have to wonder what the jury was thinking about delivering a manslaughter rather than murder verdict in this case. It is obvious the judge didn’t agree:

The judge said the fact that she was having sexual relations with another man had been disclosed a couple of days before he killed her and was therefore not “a bolt from the blue”. He said the relationship was only nine months old. He added: “The remorse you have professed in court is more directed at your own plight rather than for the woman whose life you cut short for no good reason.”

Simple, if a woman you’re with tells you she’s sleeping with someone else, leave. You’re perfectly justified in doing that. Not in attacking and murdering her.

The Anglican church is coming over all faint and having to lie down in a darkened room – or at least large parts of it are – after the US Episcopal Church (part of the international Anglican communion, as they call it) elected a woman, Katharine Jefferts Schori, Bishop of Nevada, as presiding bishop. What’s even worse, a liberal woman.

Sounds like a very necessary step forward to me, since:

Only three churches within the 38 provinces of the Anglican communion currently ordain women bishops: the US, Canada and New Zealand, though a further 11, including Ireland and Scotland have amended their canons to enable them to do so.

Yet another horrific “honour” killing sees a young women horrifically murdered by a male relative, in this case a brother. The pain and anguish of her last minutes is almost unbearable to contemplate.

Miss Nazir, 25, had rejected suitors lined up to meet her in Pakistan and had been summoned to the family home in Southall, Middlesex.
The father, also called Azhar, Nazir and the youth launched the attack and at one point dragged her by her hair back into the property.
Miss Nazir, a businesswoman described as “strong-willed”, was heard to shout at her mother, Irshad Begum: “You are not my mother any more.” She was then held down as a scarf was tied around her neck and her throat was cut in three places.

But it gets even worse – for the murderer’s two daughters – aged TWO and FOUR – were made to watch the killing, and were splattered in the blood of their cousin.

This can only be described as terrorism – those girls will no doubt be horribly emotionally scarred for the rest of their life. And while this is no doubt an extreme, it suggests that many more small, vulnerable, children must be being terrorised within families.

Is enough being done to warn girls and women at risk? (And to prevent girls being terrorised just with the threat of it?) I doubt it – of course warning someone “be careful, your parents might kill you” is not an easy message, but should more be done?

Certainly the government’s cowardice in dropping proposed legislation against forced marriage won’t help.