Bill made it through the first vote 56 to 33, but MPs are still debating more than a dozen amendments to legislation

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The introduction of a statutory requirement for doctors to gain “informed consent” before performing abortions in New South Wales will cause confusion and create an unnecessary “extra hurdle” to accessing a termination, the Australian Medical Association has warned.

The historic, cross-party bill to decriminalise abortion in NSW is being debated on the floor of the state’s parliament on Thursday, with wrangling over proposed amendments expected to go late into the night or even early Friday morning.

While a number of the amendments have been defeated, one change which means doctors will be required to receive “informed consent” before performing abortions did pass 49-41 despite being opposed by the bill’s co-sponsors.

The AMA had previously called the amendment “unnecessary and insulting” because it “is already a requirement on doctors” and on Thursday the association’s vice president in NSW, Danielle McMullen, said the passing of the amendment risked creating confusion for doctors and patients.

“Our concern with having it as a seperate, statutory requirement within legislation is that it implies there is some extra hurdle when really there shouldn’t be, it should be the status quo for doctors who already receive informed consent in any medical interaction and particularly medical procedure,” she said.

“Informed consent is a standard part of clinical practice and the concern with it being [in] the bill is that it adds confusion, and an extra layer to the process, so that termination of pregnancy is different to every other procedure we perform.

“We would strongly refute that and say a termination is a medical procedure like any other.”

As the debate continued into Thursday evening, a number of amendments that would require women seeking an abortion undergo mandatory counselling continued to be debated. While some were defeated, variations of that proposal continued to be put.

Earlier, a proposal to place increased restrictions on women seeking abortions after 22 weeks was scrapped, after a last-minute compromise on the floor of the parliament.

The original bill made it through the first vote 56 to 33, but MPs are still debating more than a dozen amendments to the legislation.

NSW abortion law: Health groups say amendments are 'unnecessary and insulting' Read more

An early bid to delay the bill by referring it to a committee failed, as did an attempt to move the point at which a pregnant woman would need the approval of two doctors before undergoing a termination from 22 to 20 weeks.

Two senior Liberal party ministers, Mark Speakman and Rob Stokes, had earlier flagged they would move amendments that would have placed new restrictions on terminations after 22 weeks.

The amendment would have meant a pregnant woman would need the approval of a four-person hospital advisory committee, rather than a second medical practitioner as proposed under the original bill.

On Wednesday the Australian Medical Association called that plan “concerning”, saying it would “place women at significant risk of unnecessary delay and only add to their suffering, particularly women in regional and rural areas”.

“In the vast majority of cases, abortions after 22 weeks arise due to a significant abnormality in the foetus,” the AMA said.

“Families and their doctors already face the most difficult decision of whether to end a wanted pregnancy and these amendments would draw out that process and make it more painful.”

But on Thursday Speakman told the parliament he would withdraw the amendment, saying he and Stokes had mistakenly believed that such advisory bodies were already “invariable practice”.

“Our amendments have been intended not to preclude anything that is currently happening with late term abortions in NSW [but] rather, given the gravity of what are life and death decisions made at this late stage to reflect a light touch of regulation in the bill,” he said.

“It is clear now that these advisory committees aren’t the invariable practice and it was never intended to put up something that would impede relatively rare late term terminations happening now.

“I have been called many things and am worthy of many criticisms but I don’t think any one has ever called me, until the last 24 hours, an extremist.”

Instead, the 15 co-sponsors supporting the original bill agreed to change the definition of the two doctors who must sign-off on a termination after 22 weeks so that at-least one must be a specialist obstetrician or gynaecologist.

'Arrest us': women who have had abortions speak out to support NSW decriminalisation Read more

Despite having the support of MPs from across the major parties, including the premier, Gladys Berejiklian, and the health minister, Brad Hazzard, the bill has been subjected to significant pushback from conservative MPs, the Catholic church and anti-abortion activists.

Both major parties have a conscience vote on the bill, and on the floor of the parliament on Thursday Liberal ministers found themselves arguing on opposite sides of the chamber, with Hazzard leading the supporters of the bill while Speakman and Stokes worked with opponents of the bill.

Before question time on Thursday one of the bill’s co-sponsors, the Liberal MP Leslie Williams, moved amendments around the location of where late-term abortions must take place in an attempt to placate wavering voters which passed without opposition.