NSW Parliament agreed to the Greens’ abortion access bill on May 14, after rejecting a conservative scare campaign, including from former Prime Minister Tony Abbott.
Dr Amanda Cohn’s private member’s , bill will expand access to abortion across the state by enabling nurse practitioners and endorsed midwives to prescribe abortion medication. It will require additional public reporting on access.
“Abortion is health care and that has been re-affirmed by the parliament today,” Cohan said.
It means that the ǰپDzڴǰ2019 now ensures greater access, particularly to those in rural NSW. Currently, only a medical practitioner can prescribe a medical abortion.
This is despite the Therapeutic Goods Administration deciding in 2023 that nurse practitioners and endorsed midwives can also prescribe abortion medication, changes which have been adopted in several other states and territories.
The bill passed 25 to 15 in the Legislative Council on May 7, before being passed by 65 to 20 Legislative Assembly MPs on May 14. That included the Labor Premier, Liberal Opposition Leader, health minister and shadow health minister.
Cohn told ABC Radio on May 15 that the fact that Labor, Liberal and National parties had all made it a conscience vote worked in the bill's favour.
“At a time when advocates for women’s rights and reproductive rights have been anxious that our hard-fought rights could be eroded, it’s significant for the NSW Parliament, across party lines, to not only safeguard reproductive rights in NSW, but improve them,” Cohn said.
She warned that equitable access to reproductive health care in rural NSW would not be “fixed by this bill alone” and urged the government to “fund abortion services in public hospitals as the .”
Newtown MP Jenny Leong said when the Greens co-sponsored the Abortion Law Reform Act in 2019, which removed it from the Crimes Act 1900, it was only “the first step of many”.
“Access to essential reproductive care should not depend on your postcode,” Leong said.