Family First's Jane Foreman says Jess Wilson and Ben Carroll spent the weekend arguing about whether Victoria's abortion laws will change, and neither of them would tell Victorians what those laws already allow.
Opposition Leader Jess Wilson told The Sunday Age on the weekend that Victoria's abortion laws, which provide legal access to terminations at any stage of pregnancy, would not be changed by a Coalition government. "Abortion law will not change under a Liberal and Nationals government. Full stop," she said. "Anyone that claims otherwise is simply wrong." Premier Ben Carroll answered that Ms Wilson "won't be calling the shots" on abortion law.
In June the then Premier, Jacinta Allan, said abortion was not up for debate. On the weekend the Opposition Leader said it will not change, full stop. Victoria's 2008 law gives a woman the right to an abortion up to the 24th week, and after that two medical practitioners need only agree that an abortion is "appropriate in all the circumstances".
"Two leaders, two parties, and the same instruction to Victorians: do not ask," said Mrs Foreman.
"Neither of them will say what this law permits. It permits abortion at any stage of pregnancy. It permits a baby girl to be aborted because she is a girl."
Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell, who wants more politicians championing choice, says nobody in Parliament is talking about abortion and that "everyone is scared to say the word".
"Georgie Purcell is right about one thing. Everybody in that Parliament is scared to say the word," said Mrs Foreman. "I am not."
The restriction Family First asks for is not a radical one. In June a Family First bill to restrict abortion after 25 weeks passed the South Australian upper house. It was defeated in the lower house on a conscience vote, but South Australia's Labor Premier, Peter Malinauskas, and its Liberal Opposition Leader, Ashton Hurn, both voted for it.
"In Adelaide a Labor Premier and a Liberal Opposition Leader voted to protect a baby at 25 weeks," said Mrs Foreman. "In Melbourne the people holding those same two jobs call it off limits."
Reliable statistics on surgical abortions in Victoria are not readily accessible. Abortion medication was prescribed to 13,108 Victorian women last year.
"A state that cannot even count them does not want to know," said Mrs Foreman.
Family First is committed to supporting legislation banning late-term abortion, mandating care for babies who survive an abortion and prohibiting sex-selection abortion, to criminalising coercion to abort, and to legislative and financial support of crisis pregnancy centres, so that a woman in a crisis pregnancy has a real alternative.
Mrs Foreman says Victorians get two votes in November. One changes the government. The other puts Family First in the Legislative Council, where somebody will say the word whoever wins.
