Abortion no longer a crime in NZ after historic vote in Parliament

Abortion no longer a crime in NZ after historic vote in Parliament
Parliament has voted 68-51 tonight in favour to decriminalise abortion and remove it from the Crimes Act.

Anna Whyte, 1 News Politics Reporter
Wed, Mar 18

The Abortion Legislation Bill will remove the statutory test for a person who is less than 20 weeks pregnant and allow a woman to self-refer to an abortion provider.

Heated speeches were delivered by MPs for and against, during the third and final reading of the bill. It will now be signed off by the Governor-General to become law.

Continued: https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/abortion-no-longer-crime-in-nz-after-historic-vote-parliament

New Zealand – Voting mix-up sees abortion safe-zones axed and MPs ‘gutted’

Voting mix-up sees abortion safe-zones axed and MPs 'gutted'

11 Mar, 2020
By: Amelia Wade, Reporter, NZ Herald

Justice Minister Andrew Little is disappointed that proposed "safe zones" around abortion clinics got axed late last night in a voting mix-up.

But Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who supported the proposal to establish 150m protest-free areas around clinics, has brushed off the error as "the outcome of democracy".

Continued: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12315875

NEW ZEALAND – Abortion Law Reform Bill passes first reading by wide margin

NEW ZEALAND – Abortion Law Reform Bill passes first reading by wide margin

by International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion
Aug 16, 2019

The long awaited, draft abortion law reform bill passed its first reading, 94 to 23, in the Parliament on 8 August 2019. “The biggest change was taking it out of the criminal code, which is very positive,” reported Jackie Edmond, head of Family Planning NZ, since abortion services were still managed through the Ministry of Justice, even though it’s a health service.

In the last 10 years, 2,566 women have been told that their request for an abortion was unjustified, according to a report from Stuff Circuit, an investigative reporting group, with data from the NZ Abortion Supervisory Committee.

ALRANZ reports that much of the new bill is great, but not everything. Here are the things Terry Bellamak says the government definitely got right:

Continued: https://www.safeabortionwomensright.org/new-zealand-abortion-law-reform-bill-passes-first-reading-by-wide-margin/