A public space protection order (PSPO) to prevent pro-life groups gathering outside an abortion clinic in London has been extended.
Ealing Council's cabinet members have approved a plan to extend the order outside the Marie Stopes clinic, now called MSI Reproductive Choices, which was due to come to an end in April this year.
More than 4,600 people shared their views during a consultation for the next steps, with 97 per cent agreeing with the plan to renew the PSPO for another three years, as reported by MyLondon.
Ealing Council was the first in the country to create a 100-metre protest-free "buffer zone" outside a Marie Stopes clinic in the west London borough after pro-life activists were accused of intimidating the clinic's patients.
Vigil members deny the claims and say they simply pray and offer patients counselling and other options besides abortion.
Groups like the Be Here for Me campaign group, one of the groups that runs vigils outside clinics, said the PSPO criminalises "assembly, religion, thought, expression and reception of information."
Be Here for Me said on its website that over 500 women had "accepted help from the vigil in Ealing over the past five years."
A number of legal challenges to overturn the PSPO have been unsuccessful, including in the Supreme Court.
The Royal College of Midwives (RCM) has advocated strongly for a "national solution whereby 'buffer zones' are established outside all premises which provide abortion services."
