Helen Clark says abortion laws need updating, something she failed to do when in power

Former prime minister Helen Clark says abortion should be "simply a decision made between a woman and her doctor".

Clark, who is also a former health minister and director of gender advocacy group Women Deliver, told The Project abortion laws need liberalising, and the provision should be removed from the Crimes Act.

During the election campaign, now-Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said abortion should be taken out of the Crimes Act.

Clark said she agreed with Ardern, adding that she tried to have the provision removed when she was health minister in 1989, but met too much opposition.

Some of that opposition was from the doctors profiting from the provision in the law.

ROSA WOODS/STUFF

Former prime minister Helen Clark says NZ's abortion laws need liberalising. When she tried to make this move almost 30 years ago, she came up against considerable opposition.

The provision makes abortion a crime, unless there are certain grounds and the foetus is under 20 weeks' gestation, including if the pregnancy poses serious danger to the pregnant person's life, health, and mental health; if there is substantial risk that the child would be "seriously handicapped"; the pregnancy is the result of any form of incest; or the pregnant person is "severely subnormal".

Abortion is legal if two certifying doctors agree continuing the pregnancy would result in serious danger to a woman's mental or physical health.

"We have complicated law, because the Crimes Act says abortion is an offence, but then we have the Contraception and Sterilisation Act, which gives grounds on which you can get an abortion," Clark said.

And while that was often liberally interpreted by doctors, and Kiwi women were able to access abortions, Clark told The Project it should be "simply a decision made between a woman and her doctor".

The comments come after Ireland voted to liberalise its restrictive abortion laws last week.

The vote means the Irish Government will legislate by the end of the year to make it relatively easy for a woman to obtain the procedure in early pregnancy. Previously, Ireland had restrictive abortion laws.

ROSS GIBLIN/STUFF

During the election campaign, Jacinda Ardern promised to liberalise abortion laws, removing it from the Crimes Act.

Ministers have promised to allow terminations within the first 12 weeks, subject to medical advice and a cooling-off period, and between 12 and 24 weeks in exceptional circumstances.

That means Ireland, a deeply Catholic conservative nation, will be more liberal than New Zealand when it comes to abortion laws.

Following Ardern's comments on the election trail, where she said women should be able to access abortion as a right, Justice Minister Andrew Little asked the Law Commission to review New Zealand's law.

It had been tasked with considering changes, including removing abortion from the Crimes Act and making it a health issue.

Little said the Law Commission is due to report back to him by the end of this year and, providing the Government can agree on the recommendations, he says it's possible there could be legislation before Parliament next year.

However, National leader Simon Bridges said he would be "loathe to" remove abortion from the Crimes Act.

Speaking to RNZ on Monday, he said: "I have not seen the case for change in this area. Overall, I think the regime we have for abortions is working well."

Bridges is a socially conservative Christian, similar to his Catholic predecessor Bill English, who also opposed liberalisation to abortion law.

Ahead of the election, English said current set-up was "broadly acceptable".

However, in the past decade, close to 1500 women have been refused an abortion by the state.