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I was tasked with asking a question about what political parties would do to reform our medically outdated 36 year old abortion law, including the fact that abortion is still in the Crimes Act (1961).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