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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 10 Hansard (25 November) . . Page.. 2898 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

I also have a letter from Dr Tony Adams that I would like to read. He writes to Assembly members:

I write to add my name to the list of those in the ACT who support strongly the right of women to safe and legal abortion in the Territory.

One of the most enduring memories of my career in medicine was, as a junior intern in Adelaide in 1960, of standing helplessly by the bed of an 18 year old girl as she died from gas gangrene as the result of a back yard abortion.

Working in student health services in Sydney in the late 1960s I again came across the results of desperate young women seeking dangerous illegal abortions.

This public health problem virtually disappeared in the early 1970s when termination of pregnancy was made legal across most of Australia.

This discussion obviously has occurred in the past and it is extremely upsetting to everyone in the ACT that we are having it again.

Another point that needs raising in this debate is the fact that Mr Osborne has not been a great ally of my work on services for families and children at risk and has not been a strong voice on issues that contribute to a pregnancy being unwanted, including education, welfare, public housing, and community sector services. His position on abortion would have more credibility if he had come out as strongly on these issues because, obviously, there is a relationship between these social factors and the choice women make about their fertility. I do not recall Mr Osborne initiating any debate that has contributed to advancing these issues.

In the many speeches I made in the last Assembly about the importance of family support services, about inadequate community services, about increasing costs of education, and about the committee inquiries I have chaired looking at these issues, mostly there was silence from Mr Osborne. That is another very unacceptable aspect of Mr Osborne's position and the position of his supporters on this issue. They should have been vocal at least over the last few years in arguing for support for these areas and so, I might add, should the church groups who are supporting this Bill.

When I voted against budgets because they were short-sighted in their priorities and did not acknowledge the long-term costs of inadequate funding and the provision of prevention and early intervention services, there was no support from Mr Osborne. Okay, that was his choice; but now he tables this legislation which basically attacks the right of women to make decisions about their lives. It would have gone down better if he had been a champion for women and families in our community, if he had raised the issue of poverty and the widening gap between the rich and the poor.

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