Details of the terminations, which took place between 2000 and 2002, follow a row about the legality of another abortion in 2001 of an otherwise healthy seven-month-old foetus with a cleft palate, which is now the subject of a police investigation in Hereford.

The Hereford case, first reported by The Sunday Times, has led to a fierce debate about Britain’s relaxed attitude to late abortions and has been followed by calls for a review of the law.

At present, babies can be aborted at up to 24 weeks for “social” reasons, and right up to birth for a defect judged to be a handicap. What constitutes a handicap serious enough to warrant late abortion has, however, never been defined.

Last weekend in The Sunday Times, Lord Steel, the architect of the 1967 Abortion Act, called for a review of abortion law, and it is expected that a government committee will now investigate the evidence for revised legislation.

The Hereford baby, which was 28 weeks through a normal 40-week pregnancy, would have been capable of a healthy life when the decision was made to terminate.

The case was brought to light by Joanna Jepson, 28, a campaigning Anglican priest opposed to abortion, who herself underwent complex surgery for a congenital jaw defect.

Doctors and senior nurses involved in giving advice in the Hereford case were interviewed last week, and the West Mercia police force, which was appointed to review their actions, is expected to announce later this month whether any criminal charges will follow.

Although cleft palate is sometimes associated with other defects, on its own it is able to be totally corrected by early plastic surgery.

According to the Department of Health, the 12 babies aborted for this mouth deformity did not have anything else wrong with them.

The department said the operations to abort all 12 of these babies took place within the 24-week upper limit for “social” abortions. However, lawyers and doctors have questioned whether the gestational ages of the foetuses may have been manipulated to avoid the kind of difficult questions raised in the Hereford case.

Cleft lip would only be seen for the first time at the routine 20-week scan, carried out to detect major abnormalities, such as heart defects, which are incompatible with life.

The object of such scans is to give mothers the option of aborting a fatally handicapped baby and avoiding the trauma of giving birth to a child destined to die almost immediately.

If a decision was being considered to abort a handicapped baby, the mother would be referred to a regional foetal medicine centre for a second opinion.

She would then be sent for a foeticide — where potassium chloride is injected to stop the baby’s heart beating — before being referred to another hospital for the artificial induction of labour.

It would be difficult for the entire process to take place within the 24-week time frame.

Jepson’s lawyer, Paul Conrathe, last week pointed out the difficulties for a mother — who presumably had previously been looking forward to the birth of her baby — to come to terms with making such a rapid decision.

“There are probably questions to be asked about all of these other abortions and a number of additional issues that could be raised,” he said.

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