Abortion protests: is free speech in retreat?

"Hair in a grey bob with a small gold cross around her neck, 64-year-old Livia Tossici-Bolt might seem an unlikely choice of a global cause célèbre," said Nicholas Pyke in the Daily Mail. But the activist has become the face of a transatlantic row over free speech after being convicted for breaching an abortion clinic "buffer zone" in 2023. Tossici-Bolt, who stood outside the Bournemouth clinic with a sign saying, "Here to talk, if you want", has been given a conditional discharge and ordered to pay £20,000 in costs.