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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 7 Hansard (5 June) . . Page.. 1900 ..

MRS DUNNE (continuing):

a strong message that, while we as a community consider that it is wrong in many circumstances to have an abortion, we are not about locking up women who feel they have no option. Women who have abortions are victims who are often confronted with no alternatives. The decisions are mostly painful, and imprisonment would be another bitter blow from an uncaring community.

This bill also creates the new offence of coercing a woman to have an abortion. If this amendment succeeds, we will be opening a new era for women to act without fear of coercion. All the literature about abortion shows us that women who feel pressured into making a decision to have an abortion have a much higher likelihood of being adversely affected. The experience of post-abortion grief counsellors is that their caseloads have a high proportion of women who feel that they were forced to have an abortion. The abortion clinic is not the only party who stands to gain if a woman chooses to have an abortion.

In 1998 when Mrs Carnell spoke about the suite of information and the breadth of choice, I am sure she would not have considered it appropriate for the choice to be limited by a range of coercions a woman might experience in these circumstances. Anyone who has ever spent time talking to people about abortion will have heard stories about women who were bullied into opting for abortion. These women had no choice.

Those members who took time to dip into the book that I know that they all received, Melinda Tankard Reist's moving book, Giving Sorrow Words, would have come across a barrage of incidents that amounted to coercion. I will refer to a couple of incidents.

Elizabeth was young and was told to leave home until she solved her problem. In her account she writes:

I was under enormous pressure and with no job, no family support, in fact the reverse, it was tough. I was literally told to leave home and come back when I'd "sorted myself out"; which was a horrifying proposition. I was given a small brown case to pack, driven to the bus stop late one night and told "good-bye".

Beatrice was driven by an unsympathetic and faithless husband. She writes:

I was married, 38 years old, and my marriage was on the rocks ... and I fell pregnant. My husband ... made it clear he didn't want any more children, he would rather pay maintenance. I was in shock, confused ... All I ever wanted was a couple of kids and be a good wife and mother. I booked into a motel, saw the doctor ... I cried and cried, all alone ... There was no counselling before the operation. I am not blaming the staff, although in my case it would have been good to have some "ears" and advice, because I will regret [the decision I made] to my dying day. I don't use the word "choice" because at that time whatever the circumstances, when you are cornered there does not seem to be a choice. I look at my husband as the "judge" ... Had I been younger, employed in my profession, I have no doubt that I would have sent him packing. But that was not the case ...

One woman I spoke to-I will call her Cecilia-went to a clinic in Sydney to have an abortion. She was feeling nervous and unhappy, as I am sure most women in these circumstances do-and her boyfriend went along for support. Just before the procedure,

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