Heidi Stewart, head of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, said the implementation of the zones “can’t come soon enough”.
“For years our staff and the women we care for have endured anti-abortion fanatics standing outside clinics for hours on end staring at them accessing or going to provide private medical care, stopping them outside and telling them that abortion is murder.”
She added that the government should remember the law was “designed to address the harm caused by so-called silent prayer” and that “all forms of harassment” should be prohibited.
Catherine Robinson, a spokesperson for Right To Life UK, said the zones would mean “vital practical support provided by volunteers outside abortion clinics, which helps to provide a genuine choice, and offers help to women who may be undergoing coercion, will be removed”.
Ealing council, in west London, established the country’s first buffer zone around a Marie Stopes clinic in 2018 – using a Public Space Protection Order to give local police the power to move, or even fine, anyone who breached it.
The proposal was subjected to a legal challenge but was ultimately allowed to continue.
On social media Rupa Huq,, external Labour MP for Ealing, said she was pleased that “safe access zones finally becoming reality within next month”.
She added: “Ealing introduced first ever one and has led the way. Women up and down the country will now have same protections.”
Bishop Sherrington, a spokesman for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, said the buffer zone legislation discriminates against people of faith.
In a statement he said: “By legislating for and implementing so-called ‘safe access zones’, the UK government has taken an unnecessary and disproportionate step backwards in the protection of religious and civic freedoms.
“Religious freedom includes the right to manifest one’s private beliefs in public through witness, prayer and charitable outreach, including outside abortion facilities.”