Lee Rhiannon (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The Health Insurance Amendment (Medicare Funding for Certain Types of Abortion) Bill, moved by Democratic Labor Party Senator John Madigan, is not about sex selection abortion. The Greens share concerns about sex selection abortion where it occurs. However, there is no evidence abortions procured on the basis of selecting the gender of the child are occurring in Australia or that Medicare is being used to fund such procedures. The proposer of the bill, Senator Madigan, and the submissions that we have received show no evidence that there is this problem—a very serious problem, I certainly acknowledge—occurring in Australia. We have heard reports of anecdotal incidents, but have no evidence.

We need to look at why this is occurring. Why is this bill being advanced in the Senate? It is actually the latest ugly tactic of those who want to limit women's sexual reproductive rights. For many, their aim is to ban women's right to choose abortion. Quite seriously, this bill is unnecessary, and it is vexatious. It is about whipping up unfounded fear in the community by stigmatising women who seek abortion. That is certainly an underlying result. The tactic behind this bill is straight out of the US anti-choice campaign song book. That is a very ugly campaign also, where there is a real push to stop women seeking the full range of sexual and reproductive health rights. The tactic that so many of those people are now using is to chip away at smaller targets that limit women's right to choose.

In speaking about the US, while there are many who attack women's rights in this way, there are also some heroic people defending women's rights. Considering we are debating this bill this week, we should note and congratulate Senator Wendy Davis who spoke in the Texas Senate this week for more than now nine hours to try to stop an anti-abortion bill that, if it becomes law, would force a number of clinics to close. I was inspired by her passion and commitment on this issue—something that I think we need more of in this parliament.

It is also important to note that this bill comes before the Senate the day after Australia's first female Prime Minister was sacked. While the Greens clearly parted company with the former Gillard government on many issues, I congratulate the former Prime Minister for highlighting women's abortion rights, their right to access abortion. The attacks that rained down on her when she made those comments, for me, highlighted how spot-on she was to raise this very issue. Comments from conservative MPs and from some commentators were revealing in the misinformation that is so often peddled about abortion and that is being pushed at this time in terms of how the tactics around this issue are rolling out. We were told that the abortion issue was settled, that there is no problem with the law, that it is not a federal issue and that Mr Abbott is not against women's rights. This bill shows how right Ms Gillard was to raise the issue and how right she was in what she raised. This bill is a shot across the bows of Mr Abbott.

We are yet to see if Senator Madigan will use his vote to try to roll back women's right to choose, in a similar way to what former Senator Harradine achieved. We all know that Senator Madigan could have great influence over an Abbott government as he may end up sharing the balance of power in the Senate. If that occurs we obviously do not know what will happen but, again, it is relevant to the tactics being used here. In his speech just delivered Senator Madigan spoke about fights for another day. Those were his exact words, 'fights for another day', which carry a clear implication that the senator is preparing further attacks on women's right to choose. What we know is that the former Prime Minister, in her speech on 11 June, flushed out the opposition leader, Tony Abbott, on the abortion issue.