Funding for abortion referral

By Susan Price

BRISBANE -- In a historic decision, Children By Choice, the only pregnancy counselling service offering advice on abortion, received $200,000 from the Queensland Health Department, as part of the government's budget brought down last month.

In its 20-year history, Children By Choice has existed without governmental support. Pregnancy Help, an organisation supported by the anti-abortion lobby, has received continued funding to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars from both the former National Party government and the present Labor government.

Despite the Goss government's decision to help fund Children by Choice, Labor refuses to implement its promise to remove abortion from the state's criminal code.

Attorney-General Deane Wells has given strict instructions to the Criminal Justice Commission to ignore all sections of the criminal code dealing with abortion. The CJC was set up following the Fitzgerald corruption inquiry recommendation that the criminal code needed to be reviewed in order to reflect prevailing social values. n

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