Responding to comments on the BBC Sunday Politics programme, Councillor Bradshaw said: “I am sorry that Dr McDonnell has opted to mislead us on this highly sensitive issue, and it is hard to believe this is not a deliberate attempt to defend the indefensible position he had already taken.
“The consultation concerns specifically the making available of abortion services in case of fatal foetal abnormality.
“It is quite wrong to suggest that anyone will ever be ‘coerced’ into having an abortion; nor has the consultation anything to do with disability.
“Dr McDonnell has already been proven to be out of step with the medical profession on this issue. It is absolutely clear that, in some limited and tragic circumstances, there is no doubt that the foetus cannot survive. It is those circumstances, and those circumstances only, which are at issue.
“Regardless of people’s view, to try to deflect attention from the issue by bizarre references to ‘coercion’ or even ‘club feet’ is to do a disservice to a highly difficult topic which needs highly sensitive handling and a fair public debate based on the actual issues and experiences at hand.”