Bill
Human Rights (Children Born Alive Protection) Bill 2022
lapsed, as at 2025-07-21.
- Sponsor
- Canavan
- Portfolio
- Not recorded
Recorded stages
- introduced — 2022-11-30
- second reading — 2022-11-30
- other — 2025-07-21
Divisions
No divisions recorded. Most questions are decided on the voices; this does not establish that a bill was unopposed.
Plain-language summary
Written by a model from the explanatory memorandum; not the record, as at 2022-11-30.
The bill would create a criminal offence for medical staff who fail to give a baby that is born alive after an abortion the same care any other newborn would get.
It would make it a legal duty for doctors and nurses to treat such babies no differently from other children, and would require professional registration boards to handle any breach as they would other misconduct.
The bill would not apply to the mother, and it would require medical staff to record these births so official statistics can be compiled.
- Creates a new offence for health practitioners who neglect a baby born alive after a termination.
- Codifies the duty of medical professionals to provide care to such babies as if the birth were not the result of a termination.
- Requires health practitioner registration boards to address breaches of this duty like any other alleged breach.
- Exempts mothers from prosecution under the bill.
- Imposes a duty on health practitioners to report births of babies born alive after terminations for statistical purposes.
Health practitioners and babies born alive as a result of a termination, with mothers exempt from prosecution.
Sources
em
billhome