Welcome to the ALRANZ blog

Welcome to the ALRANZ blog on Issues.co.nz

We will post regular updates here on issues that relate to women’s reproductive health and freedom, and we welcome your comments. You can either post comments to the blog or contact us directly at safeandlegal(at)gmail(dot)com.

This blog is moderated and although we aim to post all relevant comments, in keeping with common sense and the rules of Issues.co.nz, we will not post comments that are “threatening, defamatory, obscene, harassing or offensive,” or that link to those kinds of posts. Comments from abortion opponents will be posted to the extent they meet the above criteria and reflect a willingness to respectfully discuss the issues, and will not be posted to the extent they do not meet the guidelines and repeat well-rehearsed anti-abortion talking points, with which we are all very familiar. We will revisit these guidelines as the need arises.

In The News This Week

In the news this week was the long-running Right to Life v. Abortion Supervisory Committee case. This case was begun in 2005 by the Christchurch-based anti-abortion group Right to Life, has been before nine judges so far, and has cost the government around $280,000 and counting. The latest round was this past Monday, July 20, 2009, before Justice Miller in the High Court in Wellington. Readers may recall Miller was the judge who, in June last year, wrote in a judgment that: “There is reason to doubt the lawfulness of many abortions authorised by certifying consultants.”

Right to Life wants the courts to force the ASC to crack down on Certifying Consultants, or as the group itself put it: “to have Justice Miller issue precise declarations to the Abortion Supervisory Committee [ASC] requesting that they fulfil their statutory duty to hold certifying consultants accountable for the exercise of their duty of certifying the performance of abortions and this way restrain the unlawful de facto abortion on demand prevailing at present in New Zealand.”

Right to Life has also been seeking, through this court action, “legal recognition of the status of the unborn child as a human being and a person endowed by its Creator with human rights.” That, of course, means giving fertilised eggs personhood, which would in turn mean outlawing many forms of contraception as well as stem-cell research and IVF treatment. RTL hasn’t made any progress on the latter claim, but, per Miller’s June 2008 ruling, made some ground with the former.

However Miller rules this time, and an outcome is expected sometime in August, the case is likely to go back to the Appeal Court. (For a timeline of the case, visit alranz.org)

Media coverage of this week’s hearing was patchy – journalists for the most part don’t understand the law, how it works or its history. But that wasn’t the problem with the TV One report on Monday night, which gave a lot of time to “Jane”, who regrets her abortion. We wonder if “Jane” was one of the six women who swore affidavits in the RTL case a few years ago – affidavits that were thrown out. We suspect so since Radio New Zealand also used one of the five women in a documentary last year and did not identify her as such. If you felt the TVNZ report was biased, do make sure you tell them so. There’s a comment option on their website, under “contact us”. TVNZ alleges it reads all such comments.

One of our readers wrote (before we got our blog up): “I thought tonight’s TV One news was very biased. It gave an excessive amount of time to one woman with a bad experience. OK, so one woman has regretted her decision and has now become a member of the anti-abortion group. What about all the women who have been very grateful for being able to have a termination? What about an in-depth response concerning abortion becoming a medical matter?”

Please, let us know what you think. Bookmark our blog and visit us regularly for pro-choice updates.