By Bronwen Beechey
MELBOURNE — Women are fighting back against the Kennett government's decision, announced on March 5, that the state's 40 family planning clinics are to be closed. Health minister Marie Tehan stated that the clinics were no longer needed because the same service could be provided by GPs, hospitals and community health centres.
The Family Planning Association, which runs two clinics in the inner city, reported that its switchboards were jammed by women concerned at the cuts. The Australian Nursing Federation has also condemned the move, stating that Tehan's decision displayed "frightening ignorance" and would force health care back 20 years.
A protest rally called by the Victorian Women's Coalition on March 21 attracted around 200 people at short notice. Speakers made it clear that the closure of family planning clinics will have a disastrous impact for many women. Young women, women in rural areas and women of non-English-speaking background particularly rely on the clinics to provide contraception, sexuality counselling, Pap smears, advice on AIDS and other STDs, and a range of other services in a non-judgmental and confidential atmosphere.
Jo Wainer, director of the Wainer Women's Clinic and a long-time campaigner for women's reproductive rights, stressed the need for women-specific services grounded in women's experience.
Dr Anna Lavelle, executive director of the Family Planning Association, pointed out that while the FPA's two clinics are not immediately threatened with closure (they receive the bulk of their funding from the Federal government), state government-funded programs run by the FPA are at risk. These include an education program on contraception, sexuality and protective behaviours for intellectually disabled women. Dr Lavelle pointed out that, on a per capita basis, Victorian women receive less family planning funding than any other state.
"The first that family planning clinic workers knew about the cuts was when we read it in the Age", Karen Berzins, a doctor at the Flemington Family Planning Clinic, told the rally.
She added that when Health Department workers were persuaded to discuss the decision with clinic workers, they revealed an amazing ignorance. They were completely unaware that 80% of the Flemington clinic's clients did not speak English as a first language, and that the centre employed interpreters. They were also unaware that many of the women were Muslims who would not go to male doctors, and that there is only one other female doctor in the area.
The outcry over the planned closures forced Tehan to modify her earlier statements. On March 22 she stated that the clinics would remain open. However, the state government still intended to cut $480,000 from the clinics' $1.1 million budget. Karen Berzins told 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly that Tehan's announcement changes very little. "The clinics may remain open, but cuts on that scale will mean that no doctors will be available."
Moira Muldoon, a nurse who has worked for 12 years at the Flemington clinic, said that the first cuts to family planning clinics took place two years ago under the Labor government. "We were expecting more cuts to come under the Liberals, but we didn't expect them on this scale."
Many women know through bitter experience that moralistic and sexist attitudes are still rife in the medical profession. Moira Muldoon describes an incident when a young women came to a clinic in tears after asking her family doctor for the morning-after pill. She was subjected to a lecture on her morals by the doctor, who also threatened to inform her parents about her sexual activities. Such cases are by no means uncommon.
The clinics are circulating a petition and are asking women who have experienced poor treatment from GPs to contact their local clinic so that these experiences can be passed on to the minister.
The move to close down family planning clinics is the latest in a series of cuts by the Liberals to women's services. These include a 3% cut to sexual assault centres, a 10% cut to family violence outreach programs and the withdrawal of funding to the Grey Sisters, an order of nuns who run a hostel for mothers finding it hard to cope. A sticker distributed by supporters of the clinics sums up the feelings of many, as well as the long-term effect of the cuts: "Victorian government makes women sick."