Australian Democrats leader Senator Lyn Allison today accused prominent Family First members, including a state parliament candidate, of “harassing and abusing vulnerable women” outside the East Melbourne Day Clinic.
“Family First has taken its anti-choice stance too far. Prominent members of the extreme right-wing party have been harassing and abusing women who terminate their pregnancies,” she said.
“Security guards have told me that the protesters often yell at women entering the clinic and follow them down the street as they leave. They accuse the women of being murderers. These certainly aren’t the kinds of people we want represented in our parliament.
“This is the same clinic where an anti-choice protester shot dead a security guard in 2001 before attempting to massacre all staff and clients,” she said.
Senator Allison today made a video submission to the Victorian Law Reform Commission in which she argued that a buffer zone should be created around clinics for terminations: “The buffer zone would allow women to access the clinic safely and free from harassment and abuse.”
The senator will tomorrow launch the Democrats policy on women’s reproductive health outside the clinic. She will be joined by Dr Susie Allanson, who witnessed and wrote a book about the 2001 shooting.
Family First are opposed to abortion and believe that women seeking abortions should be forced to view ultrasound pictures of their foetus and listen to warnings about grief, depression and sterilisation.
