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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-03-25 Daily Xml
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FOREIGN AID

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (20:28): I seek leave to move the motion standing in my name in an amended form.

Leave granted.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I move:

That this council congratulates Australia's Foreign Minister, the Hon. Stephen Smith MP, for lifting the ban on Australian foreign aid being spent on abortion services and counselling on 10 March 2009 following the lifting of the global gag by the President of the United States of America, Barack Obama, on 23 January 2009.

The original motion, and now the substantive motion, notes that, as one of the first acts of the US President, Barack Obama removed the global gag, also known as the Mexico City Policy, which prevented non-government organisations from using United States taxpayer aid funds to educate women overseas about unsafe abortion, or provide them with safe abortions. It also notes that the Hon. Stephen Smith has now aligned our position with that which is most commonly held by western nations around the world.

The phrase 'global gag' grew out of the rigidity of the rules. Clinics that even mentioned abortion to women who had unplanned pregnancies were unable to receive any US taxpayer funds. The rule was brought in by Regan in 1984, revoked by Clinton, reinstated by Bush Junior, and then rescinded by Obama. Its fate can perhaps be seen as a signifier for the contemporary state of the culture wars in the United States.

The United States under George W. Bush, and Australia under John Howard, gave family planning aid to developing countries on the condition that no information on abortion was to be provided to women under any circumstances, even when that woman's life might be in danger.

Whilst President Obama has been prompt in rescinding the US equivalent, the AusAID Family Planning Guidelines were until recently firmly in place, despite much lobbying of foreign affairs minister Stephen Smith. It was not a hard change to be made. The Family Planning Guidelines are in policy, not in regulation or legislation. A change did not require debate in parliament or bipartisan support: it was made with the stroke of a pen—the stroke of a pen that would save lives. Surely, it does not get any easier than that to save lives.

Unsafe abortions account for 13 per cent of maternal deaths globally. As I have said before in this place, the lack of provision for safe abortions does not stop women from seeking abortions: it just means they are more likely to die in the process. We must remember that one woman dies from an unsafe abortion somewhere in the world every eight minutes. Every eight minutes one woman dies somewhere in the world through unsafe abortion practices.

It is not our place to dictate to other countries what their laws should be. I am not proposing that we fund abortions in nations where they are illegal. What I am saying is that we need to make sure that women who live in countries where these services are legally available are financially able to access them.

There were so many reasons that the Australian government needed to make this change. We do not need to look far from our own borders to see where such a change would make a huge difference. According to the United Nations, Papua New Guinea (one of our closest neighbours and one of our highest aid recipients) has seen the maternal death rate increase by more than 56 per cent in the past few years. In PNG, the number of women who died in childbirth, or from related complications, doubled last year. It is not only those women who die who are impacted: their families suffer the loss of a mother, a wife, a partner, a friend and a breadwinner; and the impact on girls is often compounded by the fact that, in too many instances, the eldest daughter is required to drop out of school to raise her younger siblings. Surely it is negligent on our behalf to turn a blind eye to such suffering.

Women around the world—particularly in Third World countries—still face too many barriers: to justice, education, representation, health-care access and employment opportunities. To deny them control of their reproductive health and fertility is tantamount to keeping those barriers firmly in place. After all, who are we to impose such restrictions on women overseas when we do not impose them on women in Australia? So, this is one real, tangible way that we can assist those women in their struggles. I congratulate the Australian government and the Hon. Mr Smith on this change in policy, and I commend the motion to the council.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. T.J. Stephens.

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