Catherine King: Abortion has no place in Australia's Criminal Code.

Many Australians are probably unaware that in many states it is still a crime to terminate a pregnancy. 

It’s now long overdue for Australia to join the 21st century and once and for all remove abortion from the criminal code of every state and territory.

Whilst it has long been settled by the courts that terminations are lawful where there is a serious threat to a woman’s physical or mental health, in two states — Queensland and NSW — abortion remains in the books as a criminal offence.

Section 244 of the Queensland criminal code makes it clear that any women who has an abortion outside these rules is committing an extremely serious criminal offence.

“Any person who, with intent to procure the miscarriage of a woman, whether she is or is not with child, unlawfully administers to her or causes her to take any poison or other noxious thing, or uses any force of any kind, or uses any other means whatever, is guilty of a crime, and is liable to imprisonment for 14 years”. – Queensland Criminal Code 1899

14 years!

Even in states where abortion has been removed from the criminal statutes, women will still struggle to exercise their right to a safe termination depending on who runs the nearest hospital and their access to health services.

The recent move by a private provider to try to extend medical abortion to those in rural and regional areas has highlighted, as Reproductive Choice Australia co-president Jenny Ejlak said this week, ‘‘it’s a little bit of a postcode lottery for women”.

History shows criminalising abortion does not stop women seeking terminations; it just drives them to seek unsafe, unregulated abortions.

Illegal abortions performed prior to 1971 were second in the five main causes of maternal death for Australian women. In 1965, in Australia, there were 45 maternal deaths due to abortion. Restricting access to surgical or medical abortions will not protect women’s health; in fact, the opposite is true.

As a pro-choice woman, I am just that: protect the right of women to choose what is best for themselves. For women and men who care about them making the decision to terminate a pregnancy is not an easy one. We should support their choices as much as possible, not stigmatise them though criminal law. We should be making sure that they have access to supportive environments, adequate information and services through which to make their choices. I respect women enough to know that they have the ability to decide for themselves what is best for them. We are, after all, fully capable of moral choices. It is and should be their decision.

Abortion should be removed from the criminal codes of every single jurisdiction and the right of any women to decide whether or not to continue with a pregnancy has no place in the criminal code of Australia in the 21^st century.