Conscience Voting and Mifepristone
There’ll most likely be a conscience vote in the lower house on Mifepristone/RU486 thanks to the the Prime Minister. A good thing that will provide for better health services for women, but why can’t the Coalition party room have some courage and simply bind its members?
The conscience vote is to get around the bizarre fixations of the Health Minister, Tony Abbott, about the services to which women should be entitled. A far nicer solution would have been for Cabinet to tell Tony Abbott to pull his head in, instead of opting for ‘whatever’ll get me in least trouble’ lines like this one, reported in the Herald article above:
Mr Howard said in South Korea yesterday: “Normally what we do in relation to these matters is to allow a free vote and my normal disposition and that of the Government is that the only fair, sensible and right thing to do is to allow a free vote.”
Ah well. It’s only in Parliament that it’s possible to advance good policy through a strategy of ruthlessly copping out.
Incidentally Kate of moment to moment has the good oil on the drug itself and the arguments, and commenter Mary at Flute’s place has obviously done her homework:
Mifepristone has been banned from import but misoprostol is available and both have medical applications in addition to their combined use as outlined above.
Mifepristone is a progesterone antagonist with antigluccorticoid activity and can be used to treat a range of tumours and cancers eg. 40—50% success in stopping further growth of progesterone dependent meningiomas, endometriosis and fibroid tumours some breast and ovarian cancers as well as a range of other medical applications.
This is the medication that Tony Abbott does not want to see brought into the country due to his anti-abortion stance. Abortion is legal so this only provide a less intrusive option to surgical abortion and in addition other people who may benefit from it’s other medical uses may also benefit.
dibo wrote:
oh but Liam, the same applies for the grand and progressive ALP…
Liam wrote:
Well, I’d like to think that the ‘grand’ and ‘progressive’ ALP would have refused admission to anyone as freakishly perverse as Tony Abbott. That’s right isn’t it? Yes? No?
[cowers, not wanting to hear the answer]
amanda_r wrote:
There was a debate about the conscience vote at the last Labor Women’s Network conference.
The problem is that banning the conscience vote would make it just as likely that pro-choicers are bound to vote against such measures.
It would all come down to numbers, and it’s not something that either side is willing to risk right now.
Here in WA we have a few Abbott-style members when it comes to issues like this one.
dibo wrote:
I tend to think this is a funny area of binding, where both sides refuse to bind because they’re more confident of winning if they don’t… The Libs are having a free vote, but the rising proportion of a) nutters and b) people who are bound by debts of support to nutters in their party room means that i’m not at all sure that this is going to go the pro-choice way.
amanda_r wrote:
That’s not why people call for conscience votes. If they were confident of having the numbers in caucus they’d be comfortable with a binding vote on everyone else.
It’s when they are not certain they have the numbers, and hence are worried that they may be forced to vote against the pro-choice position.
Kieran Bennett (not verified) wrote:
Its the kind of issue that divides the liberal party a bit, and it could divide them enough to see members crossing the floor. That’s something Howard wants to prevent even more than legalizing RU486. It sets a nasty precedent and loosens the governments grip on the parliament ever so slightely.
Post new comment