Heidi Crowter, 27, is seeking a change to the UK abortion law that currently allows babies with Down’s syndrome to be aborted up until birth. In the UK, abortion can be carried out until 24 weeks and then until birth if the unborn baby is suspected of having a fetal anomaly (disability).

But Heidi has challenged the law on the grounds that it is a clear “instance of inequality” regarding people with conditions like her own and is accordingly incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights.

After losing a legal challenge at the High Court in September last year, Heidi took her case to the Court of Appeal, which today, 25 November, concluded that “it is a question which is for Parliament, and not the Courts, to decide”.

Commenting on the ruling, Heidi said: “I am very upset that babies with Down’s Syndrome can be aborted up to birth. This tells me that I am not valued and of much less value than a person without Down’s Syndrome… I am angry that the judges say that my feelings don’t matter. That makes me feel that I am not as valuable as a person without Down’s Syndrome.”