MEDIA RELEASE

Young women’s organisation says Prime Minister is in the ‘white picket fence brigade’ on IVF stance

The YWCA Victoria has criticised the Prime Minster for his threat to overrule a Federal Court decision allowing single women access to Victoria’s in-vitro fertilisation and assisted reproduction technology.

“To read Mr Howard’s comments on this issue you would think it was 1950 not the year 2000. Mr Howard is from the 1950s picket-fence brigade. It is time he moved on and embraced change. Australian society has moved on since the 1950s and his misplaced moralism is not helping the community” said Ms Janet Powell, President of the YWCA Victoria.

“The fundamental right of a child is to be wanted. What matters is that children are wanted and loved, not what family model is providing that love.”

“Mr Howard is endorsing discrimination against single women and lesbians. All women have a right to decide whether they want to have children, regardless of their marital status or sexuality. His statements on this issue undermine women’s autonomy to make their own decisions about their own lives and bodies.”

“His statements also deny the reality of the range of valid and supportive family structures existing in 2000.”

 “Mr Howard talks about the rights of the child but he wasn’t so forthcoming about the rights of the child when it came to standing up to the Northern Territory and Western Australia about mandatory sentencing.”

“This is the Prime Minister who promised to govern ‘for all of us’. He obviously isn’t interested in governing for single women and lesbians who want children.”