On  21 March 2013 the Senate referred the  Health Insurance Amendment (Medicare Funding for Certain Types of Abortion)  Bill 2013 for inquiry and report.

In undertaking the inquiry, the Committee should consider:

1. The unacceptability to Australians of the use of Medicare funding for the purpose of gender selection abortions;
2. The prevalence of gender selection - with preference for a male child - amongst some ethnic groups present in Australia and the recourse to Medicare funded abortions to terminate female children;
3. The use of Medicare funded gender-selection abortions for the purpose of 'family-balancing';
4. Support for campaigns by United Nations agencies to end the discriminatory practice of gender-selection through implementing disincentives for gender-selection abortions';
5. Concern from medical associations in first world countries about the practice of gender-selection abortion, viz. Canada, USA, UK.

Submissions should be received by  24 April 2013. The reporting date is 25 June 2013.

The Committee is seeking written submissions from interested individuals and organisations preferably in electronic form submitted  online or sent by email to  fpa.sen@aph.gov.au as an attached Adobe PDF or MS Word format document. The email must include full postal address and contact details.

Alternatively, written submissions may be sent to:

Senate Finance and Public Administration Committees
PO Box 6100
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
Australia

Notes to help you prepare your submission are available from the website at https://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/wit_sub/index.htm. Alternatively, the Committee Secretariat will be able to help you with your inquiries and can be contacted on telephone +61 2 6277 3439 or facsimile +61 2 6277 5809 or by email to  fpa.sen@aph.gov.au

Inquiries from hearing and speech impaired people should be directed to Parliament House TTY number 02 6277 7799. Adobe also provides tools at  http://access.adobe.com/ for the blind and visually impaired to access PDF documents. If you require any special arrangements to enable you to participate in the Committee's inquiry, please contact the Committee Secretariat.

Once the Committee accepts your submission, it becomes a confidential Committee document and is protected by Parliamentary Privilege. You must not release your submission without the Committee's permission. If you do, it will not be protected by Parliamentary Privilege. At some stage during the inquiry, the Committee normally makes submissions public and places them on its website. Please indicate if you want your submission to be kept confidential.

Please note: Due to the high volume of responses received for the inquiry,  submissions will be published on the website  as  time and resources permit.