received this email from Melinda Van Ligten this morning; Thank you Melinda.
Dear all,
This email contains some REALLY IMPORTANT INFORMATION about the next steps forward for the Maternity campaign. Please don't get bogged down in my explanation of the politics (I have included it for those who are interested). Just don't miss the simple message that ONE MORE LETTER IS REQUIRED from you, asap.
This may be just the action needed for all those with brewing energy and passion after seeing Minister Roxon on Q and A last night...you can include your thoughts on her response in your letter as well, what perfect timing.
On Wednesday July 22 Bruce Teakle, Bonny Marsh, Megan Gardiner and myself met with Senator Sue Boyce, Queensland Liberal Senator who is on the Senate Inquiry committee for the 3 Midwifery bills (she is on the committee that will be looking at all our submissions). She was friendly and largely supportive of our cause.
She also gave us two pieces of helpful advice. Apparently when the Senate Committee meets to discuss this issue (I believe on August 6), there is a way the public can link in online to watch the proceedings. The link for info about this is
http://webcast.aph.gov.au/livebroadcasting/ You can apparently even email the senators to ask certain questions in real time while it is going on. Take a look and get yourself set up prior to Aug 6th.
The second helpful thing she said is that once a Minister presents a piece of legislation to parliament for consideration, any letters that Minister receives relevant to the bills are stamped as "ministerials". For each proposed legislation, depending on its importance, there is a number decided upon to be the threshold of how many ministerials pile up before the red lights start flashing, so to speak. We don't know what that threshold will be for these bills, but what it does tell us is that EVERY LETTER COUNTS. Yours may be the one that tips the tally over the line!
I know that everyone has just finished working really hard on submissions to this Inquiry, but there is one more simple job to do now. Please, everyone who has written a submission (as well as anyone who didn't make the deadline for the Inquiry), please send a letter to Health Minister Nicola Roxon so it will be counted toward this 'ministerial tally'. You can use the content of your previous submission, but re-format into a letter addressed to her. The email to send it to is
Nicola.Roxon.MP@aph.gov.au or you can fax to 02)6273 4146. This needs to be done by early August when the Senate committee will meet, so the sooner the better.
I know nearly ten thousand postcards have already been sent to Nicola Roxon, but these were sent BEFORE she presented the bills to parliament, so will not be counted as ministerials. It is important to write just one more letter now.
The senate commitee is made up of three Labor Senators, two coalition Senators (Sue Boyce, Qld, and Judith Adams, WA), and one Green Senator (Rachel Siewert, WA). It would be worth key people communicating with these senators as well.
On a positive note, there must have been a flood of submissions over the weekend, because my personal one has not yet been acknowledged as received and when I emailed to check two days ago, I got an email reply saying,
Due to the large volume of submissions received to this inquiry we are processing submissions in batches. Yes, we did receive your submission and it will be acknowledged in due course.
Well done everyone on a very concerted effort! Keep up the good work.
In solidarity,
Melinda Van Ligten
