Six months into her pregnancy, Olivia Nervo believed she was preparing for a family with her partner in a monogamous, committed future. The Grammy award-winning songwriter’s world shattered when a chance encounter at his Auckland office revealed a devastating truth: the man she trusted, wealthy New Zealand businessman Matthew Pringle, was in a relationship with another woman who was also pregnant, and with whom he already had a child.
A lengthy legal battle and a search for a name
What followed was a lengthy, expensive and dispiriting court battle in London. Nervo, one half of the Australian DJ duo NERVO, sought to hold Pringle – sometimes known as the ‘honey king’ due to his Manuka Honey businesses – to account. The court proceedings provided a partial vindication. In a High Court judgment last year, Nicholas Allen KC determined that Pringle was motivated to bring family court proceedings partly to protect his privacy and reputation through the strict anonymity of family courts, as well as by a desire to establish a relationship with his daughter, whom he did not meet until she was almost four.
Pringle admitted to domestic abuse of an emotional nature, including dishonest conduct before the birth. Mr Justice Allen stated the father’s behaviour was “reprehensible” and “comes under the heading of domestic abuse,” adding that “by his deception he engineered the mother to behave in a way she would not have done otherwise.” However, another judge refused permission for a fact-finding trial to hear allegations of reproductive coercion, deeming it unnecessary for determining welfare issues. The Court of Appeal later declined to make any finding on whether reproductive coercion had occurred.
For Nervo, this omission was a profound failure. “He wouldn’t say it was reproductive coercion. The courts didn’t think it was necessary to name it, which I still disagree with,” she said. “I think labels protect us in many ways. They just sort of made it broad as emotional abuse in nature.” Her disappointment was compounded when the Court of Appeal overturned a ruling that Pringle, who withdrew his claims at the eleventh hour, should pay 75% of her legal costs, which exceeded £500,000. Lady Justice King, while calling Pringle’s behaviour “shameful and deceitful,” said the lower court should have factored in Nervo’s own litigation conduct.
Understanding reproductive coercion: ‘You fall between the cracks’
Nervo’s case brought a stark spotlight onto reproductive coercion, a form of controlling behaviour where someone interferes with another person’s ability to make decisions about their own reproductive health. It encompasses a spectrum of actions: pressuring or forcing someone to have sex without contraception, sabotaging birth control, hiding a vasectomy, or exerting extreme pressure to continue or terminate a pregnancy.
“If you have sex with someone and you don’t disclose the fact that you have an STD… that’s assault. And if you remove a condom covertly that’s considered rape,” Nervo said, referencing the UK legal classification of ‘stealthing’ as rape. “But if you deceive someone into having a child, or just even having sex, you just fall between the cracks.”
The prevalence is significant. A 2022 poll of 1,000 women aged 18 to 44 found 50% believed they had experienced some form of reproductive coercion. This included one in three feeling pressured to have sex without contraception, one in ten experiencing contraception sabotage or stealthing, and 15% reporting pressure to terminate a wanted pregnancy. A separate 2019 study suggested one in seven women in the UK had experienced coercion over reproduction.
Professor Sonja Ayeb-Karlsson, professor of intersectional justice at UCL, explains that while reproductive coercion is recognised in England and Wales as a form of coercive control under the Serious Crime Act 2015, it often gets overlooked. “Coercive control has itself taken almost 10 years to understand,” she said, and without a standalone offence, the specific pattern is missed. “I have tons of women who contact me who say: ‘This happened to me but I never spoke about it because I was so ashamed. Or, I couldn’t really put my finger on what it was or if it was wrong.’”
Legal gaps and political calls for change
The legal system’s struggle to recognise the doctrine was articulated in Parliament last month by Labour MP Natalie Fleet, who led a debate on the issue. “If our courts are presented with clear evidence of coercive behaviour that has resulted in pregnancy, yet decline to recognise or name it, we are left with a gap not just in terminology, but in protection,” she told MPs. Fleet described Nervo’s story as vital to be heard in the public interest.
Fleet argued for clearer legal recognition, stating: “We need to ensure that patterns of behaviour are examined, not dismissed, and that individuals who raise legitimate concerns are not penalised for doing so.” Her call is for reproductive coercion to be examined as a potential standalone offence.
In response, the justice minister, Alex Davies-Jones, confirmed that the current government review of family courts would examine reproductive coercion. This offers a potential pathway for greater formal recognition.
For Olivia Nervo, the personal cost has been immense, but her decision to speak out after Court of Appeal proceedings lifted reporting restrictions has had a ripple effect. Since posting on social media – where her story was viewed over a million times before reportedly being banned by Meta in the UK – she has been contacted by hundreds of women with similar experiences. Her case stands as a stark illustration of a widespread but frequently unnamed form of abuse, now pushing its way onto the legal and political agenda.
