“Any law that places half the population at risk of criminality simply because of their biology is a ridiculous and unsupportable law”, Jane Caro told a pro-choice rally on September 14 in Sydney’s Hyde Park.
Reproductive Health Care Reform Bill 2019
Supporters of the right to choose are pulling out all stops against the religious right’s attempts to derail a broadly sponsored abortion decriminalisation bill before New South Wales parliament.
As an abortion provider, pro-choice advocate and a woman who has undergone abortion in New South Wales, I support the Reproductive Health Care Reform Bill.
Even with the best access to sex education, contraception and emergency contraception (which NSW does not have), there is no pro-active way for people engaged in potentially reproductive sex but not prepared for parenthood to guarantee they will not become pregnant. Sometimes, planned pregnancies become impossible to continue, whether for health or personal reasons.
“It is simple, straight forward: stay out of the lives of women”, implored one Liberal MLA as debate in the NSW Legislative Assembly on a bill to decriminalise abortion entered its second day on August 7.
Eventually, after eleven and a half hours of debate, the Reproductive Health Care Reform Bill 2019 was passed in the lower house 59 to 31 on August 8.