Passing of the anti peaceful protest ‘Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Act’ a serious erosion of democracy

Tonight’s passing of the anti peaceful protest Bill, the ‘Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Act’ marks a serious erosion of democratic rights in New Zealand.

This Act allows bubble zones that are 300m in diameter to be enacted around abortion facilities, within which any free speech expressed in opposition to abortion will be a punishable criminal offence.

In their 2018 Government-commissioned Alternative approaches to abortion law Ministerial briefing paper, the NZ Law Commission opposed the introduction of such legislation, stating “the Commission does not suggest the introduction of safe access zones.”

After having consulted with relevant agencies, professional bodies, and abortion providers, the Law Commission was also clear that “the majority felt that safe access zones were not needed”.

On what possible grounds can the New Zealand Parliament claim they had any legitimacy in enacting such a clearly anti-democratic law when abortion facilities and their own legal experts advised against it?

The right to gather for peaceful public protest and vigil is fundamental for the healthy functioning of a democracy. The fact that our Parliament has chosen to erode this right is truly alarming in what it says about state authoritarianism in New Zealand.

Any Parliament which claims to support the right to gather for peaceful public protest in foreign nations such as Ukraine and Hong Kong, while actively working to strip those rights from its own citizens is speaking out of both sides of its mouth.

Can we now expect the Parliament to make it a criminal offence for environmentalists or climate change groups to gather for peaceful vigils and public protests near big oil companies or other sites they deem morally objectionable to their cause?

Or is it only dissenting ideological opponents who can expect to have their democratic freedoms eroded by those who wield power in our country?

This anti-democratic Act stands in stark contradiction with the vitally important rights that are enshrined in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. For this reason Voice for Life will be working hard to ensure that it is overturned and the right to peaceful public protest remains unmolested by the powerful who wish to silence voices of moral opposition.

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