The distress of abortion

Tonight I attended a ‘Women’s Choice – Suffrage eve debate’ whereby a political panel of which representatives from ACT, Greens, Labour, Mana, and National were available to answer questions submitted by representatives from women’s organisations.

I was tasked with asking a question about what political parties would do to reform our medically outdated 36 year old abortion law, including the fact that abortion is still in the Crimes Act (1961).

All representatives replied that they were pro-choice, which I was pleased to hear, yet none of them were able to say that their party had consensus on the issue and none of them were able to commit to putting in a bill in themselves.

This disappoints me.

A couple of the candidates went on to mention the “traumatic decision” that women have to make when faced with an unplanned pregnancy. I agree that there is distress involved with unplanned pregnancy but I disagree that much of the distress is around the decision itself.

The distress lies in the process to get an abortion.
The distress is in the lengthy waiting times.
The distress is in the multiple appointments.
The distress is having to convince two certifying consultants that they should approve your own decision.
The distress is going to an unfamiliar environment and feeling that you should be ashamed of something you shouldn’t be.

It’s about time that politicians acknowledged that the law creates distress for women who are already having to deal with an unwanted pregnancy. It’s about time we changed our abortion law to really allow a woman the right to choose and let’s not subject her to the distress of the current system.

Let’s take abortion out of the Crimes Act.

Flurry of media coverage around parental notification

In May the Sunday Star Times appears to have started a bit of a campaign around supporting parental notification for "teen" abortions, featuring SHOCK stories at the top of their news agenda three weeks' running.

Mothers For Choice did some media work in response to this, in particular the following:

Spokesperson Rebecca Matthews on Back Benchers (in Chapter 2)
Row rages over school abortion  - NZ Herald
Some abortion secrets need to be kept, say advocates  - TVNZ
Debate continues over abortion controversy - Otago Daily Times
I wrote a blog post critiquing the original SST article
Mothers For Choice backs girls' right - our original media release on the issue at Scoop

Court of Appeal decide against Right to Life NZ

On June 1st the Court of Appeal announced their decision in the long-running case taken by Right To Life NZ (RTL) against the Abortion Supervisory Committee (ASC). 

The basic gist of it is that they have overturned the previous High Court decision is which Justice Miller raised questions about the legality of the 98% of abortions permitted on the grounds of the mental health of the pregnant person. 

The Court of Appeal has also rejected RTL's claims that the fetus has a right to life.  (Wonder if they're going to change their name?)

Here's the Court of Appeal decision (PDF, quite long) and a summary.  The ALRANZ site has a timeline of the whole saga.

Also a round-up of pro-choice blog-posts on the matter, from The Hand Mirror.

Media coverage:
Unborn have no right to life: Court of Appeal rules - Stuff
Appeal court strikes out abortion finding - NZ Herald
Praise for court ruling over abortion - Newstalk ZB - includes link to Mike Hosking talking to Dame Margaret Sparrow of ALRANZ about the announcement
Anti-abortion group considers taking case to Supreme Court - NZ Herald

Update soonish

There's been lots and lots going on since the last News post in October last year - not least a pro-choice gathering in Wellington and some media work recently on the issue of parental notification.  Hopefully we'll get some time to update the news section soon.  Our Facebook page is pretty much always up to date, so if in doubt check there.  Thanks for your patience.