Page 2433 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 29 June 2005
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feature of the social landscape of this country that this debate will go on, and it will go on. This particular bill today has got little to do with that. That is a very important point to be made. It is simply precautionary legislation to cover the protection of unborn children, at least to a certain degree.
To reiterate: the bill enshrines the acknowledgment of lawful abortions in the Crimes Act. I say again, Chief Minister: it enshrines the acknowledgment of lawful abortions in the Crimes Act, whether we like that or not. That is what it does. Secondly, the bill also provides that it does not apply to anything done by a pregnant woman in relation to her unborn child. To the Chief Minister and to Dr Foskey, who were concerned about the separation between woman and foetus, I stress that. This bill does not seek to criticise a woman in relation to her unborn child. It is designed to make sure that we take those issues away from this debate, so as not to muddy the primary concern and objective of this bill. Those are discussions for another day and in another place.
As I have explained in my tabling statement—and it is probably worth noting again—I have reworked this legislation to meet some of the concerns raised by the government previously when I first tabled a similar piece of law. I am now hopeful that the bill could be supported. This legislation only applies to wilful acts intended to cause injury or death to the mother or unborn child.
In New South Wales we have seen the introduction—I think the New South Wales parliament is calling it Byron’s law—of a very sensible piece of legislation. It is sensible and warranted and is based on that particular case. We have heard Mrs Dunne talking about a number of cases, and I do not need to go through those again today.
This bill is not just about recklessness in terms of road incidents and other actions. It is also about protecting women in cases of domestic violence. It is important that we, as members of this Assembly, send a clear message to the community that violence against women is not acceptable and holds penalties and that violence against pregnant women is an abomination that holds more serious penalties than simply a charge of assault.
At this point, all I can see from the other side of the chamber is this: as far as they are concerned, an assault on a woman is about as far as it goes and the intended or unintended consequences, in terms of injury or death to the unborn, does not matter. It does not seem to matter to the Chief Minister.
Let us have a look at the Queensland law. The Queensland Criminal Code, section 313, provides:
Any person who, when a female is about to be delivered of a child, prevents the child from being born alive by any act or omission of such a nature that, if the child had been born and had then died, the person would be deemed to have unlawfully killed the child, is guilty of a crime and is liable to imprisonment for life.
That is the Queensland initiative. The code also provides:
Any person who unlawfully assaults a female pregnant with a child and destroys the life of, or does grievous bodily harm to, or transmits a serious disease to, the child before its birth, commits a crime—maximum penalty, imprisonment for life.
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