If this becomes an election issue,Peter Dutton knows it could significantly harm his chances of scraping into government.
The former deputy prime minister pushed back against shadow cabinet colleagues who say abortion is a state rather than federal issue.
A new report shows more than two-thirds of the state’s local government areas have no surgical abortion providers and almost 40 per cent have no listed pharmacies that dispense abortion medication.
Senior Coalition women have tried to stop an abortion debate,making clear the federal party cannot and does not want to wind back the laws.
The US-style politics of abortion has been seized on by some to breathe new life into the issue in Australia.
Political debate on abortion has been turbocharged by conservative pushes to change the law in Queensland and South Australia.
Hundreds of students and staff at Australian Catholic University marched out of Melbourne’s Convention Centre as former union boss Joe de Bruyn railed against gay marriage and abortion during a graduation ceremony.
It is a flare sent up in the political atmosphere to communicate a set of right-wing values with the control of female bodies at their centre.
An election issue in the United States,it is now reverberating in Australia.
With less than three weeks until the election,he is seeking to close the gender gap with Kamala Harris.
With 11 days down,and voting about to open,Queensland’s major party leaders are just two weeks from polling day – and the unrelenting spotlight has narrowed.