So why is the
rate of abortion rising
?
More casual sex increases the likelihood of the low rate of contraception failure occurring?
I mean just using the information in the article, 11.1% of the increase in abortions came specifically from women traveling from Northern Ireland, and the article itself looks at reduced funding for sexual healthcare and contraceptives.
It also states that older women and mothers specifically are behind the rise. Women who are far more likely to be financially stable. When the general age children are deemed "dependant" is now at at least 22-23 (age of finishing uni, a 45 yr old parent is legitimately looking at being retired before their child leave home and I think that probably has a significant bearing on that choice. Not withstanding of course that as you move past 35 there are significant health risks for having children that begin to compound rapidly.
I mean you are making conclusion even the article doesn't care to make and you aren't backing it with anything but "yeah but what about this unrelated stat". There is no reason to specifically believe abortions and fertility rates are explicitly linked socially. Ireland which has extremely strict laws around abortion until very very recently as well as socio-religious mores around contraception has followed the EXACT same trend as the UK and west more broadly.
Ireland Fertility Rate 1950-2021 | MacroTrends
And they have been below replacement since 1993 and have been fairly stable around 1.9 since then, although dropping to 1.8 in recent years. So Id ask you for evidence as to why Ireland which has none of the same policies you describe and heavy socio-cultural forcing effect which should generate large families is now on basically EXATLY the same trend as the UK just 20 years delayed? Im assuming you arent going to argue "but muh tories" for them too? I'm not au fait with Irish politics but I'm fairly sure the Tories are about as popular in Ireland as Cromwell.
In isolation you "might" be able to argue government policy has a minor impact (never something Ive denied) but even then its hard to make a compelling case this isnt just broader economic conditions and taken more broadly looking at the fertility rates of contemporary nations, they follow the exact same patterns. If its "muh tories", you need to explain why "muh tories" of the last 10 years have caused very similar patters of fertility. France for example sees the same drop in fertility rates at the onset of the 2010, although their drop literally begins in 2009 so Im going to unequivocally state thats tied to the financial crash.