Abortion back on the agenda in Victoria

The proposed changes to the law basically treat an abortion like any other medical procedure, when in fact it is a developing unborn child with its own unique DNA material which is being aborted.

The Bill institutionalises abortion on demand - any pregnant woman at any stage in her pregnancy up to term can go to a medical practitioner and demand an abortion.

The Bill fails to acknowledge and describe the alternatives to abortion that preserve the life of the developing unborn child.

There is no requirement to make available to any woman considering an abortion, suitable material displaying colour pictures of the growing child in the womb, or better still an ultrasound view of the developing unborn child in the woman’s own womb.

There is no requirement in the Bill to warn women of the risks associated with abortion. It does nothing to address the trauma that many women undergo for decades after an abortion: flashbacks, anniversary reactions, temptations to suicide, difficulties in maintaining and developing relationships, turning to drugs, increased susceptibility to breast or other cancers, and so on.

There is no requirement for independent pre-termination counselling from someone who is not an advocate of abortion and therefore no cooling off period between counselling and possible abortion of the developing unborn child. Nor is there any provision for post termination follow up.

What is required for any woman contemplating an abortion is truly independent written advice with attention drawn to other services such as those offered by the churches which can provide a second opinion.

There is nothing in the Bill to regulate the medical profession’s conduct, no guidance is offered to the medical profession as to the conditions under which an abortion of the developing unborn child might be considered (not that we wish to be considered in any way supportive of such an outcome), nor does the Bill, in a major omission, give the right for a doctor to refuse to undertake an abortion for the sake of conscience, something which the otherwise deplorable ACT legislation, Crimes (Abolition of Offence of Abortion) Act 2002 does.

If Parliamentarians wish to change the law in regard to abortion, rather than decriminalising abortion, a step in the right direction would be to alter the Crimes Act 1958 to apply the offence of Child Destruction whenever an unborn child of 20 weeks or more is aborted. Such a move would be far more widely supported in the Victorian community than Ms Broad’s ill considered and dangerous Bill.

Abortion is bad: there are far too many of them, and so the question to our politicians is, “what are you doing to reduce the number of them?