Abortion clinic may get licence

Press, 26 May 1979, Page 3

Abortion clinic may get licence

PA Auckland The Auckland Medical Aid Trust may be able to obtain a licence to perform abortions after an appeal to the Supreme Court. In a decision given yesterday. Mr Justice Speight ruled that the Abortion Supervisory Committee wrongly took into consideration several matters when the committee refused to grant a licence for the trust.

His Honour referred the case back to the committee for further consideration, ruling that the committee had no discretion as to the issue of a licence if all the criteria had been satisfied. He also held that the attitude of surgeons who would perform abortions in the hospital was not a proper consideration in declining an application for a licence.

His Honour said there was no evidence upon which the committee could properly find strong reservations about the ability of medical staff in the hospital to correctly interpret and carry out the requirements of the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion Act. His Honour further ruled that the committee was not correct in holding that if a woman met the criteria under which an abortion was lawful she should have the opportunity to have it carried out in a public hospital. That was not a reason for refusing a licence. The trust’s nursing sister. Mrs Margaret Brasted, had appealed to the Supreme Court at Auckland against the Supervisory Committee’s decision to decline a licence in August, 1978. A spokesman for the trust said it would immediately ask the committee to grant a licence, as a matter of urgency. The trustees were concerned about the situation in Auckland, where the only clinic working was unable to deal with the number of applications being made.