Liberals out of step with most women

Iam an atheist and a humanist. I lean left on most political and fiscal issues. But when Liberal MPs stormed out of a meeting of the Committee on the Status of Women in protest of the appointment of a prolife woman as its chair, I was appalled.

It is bad enough that both the Liberal and NDP parties have barred progressive Canadians from running as their candidates if they disagree with the legal status quo of abortion on demand through all nine months. But now the Liberals want to micro- manage even the voices of the Opposition? Parliament’s rules dictate that the chair of this committee be appointed by the leader of the Opposition. That ought to mean at least one voice that the Liberals do not have the right to control.

“The Liberal members of the committee cannot support the Opposition putting forward someone like Rachael Harder, whose voting record is opposed to where women stand,” declared Liberal MP and committee vicechair Pam Damoff, when she led the Sept. 26 walkout.

In fact, it is the Liberal and NDP’s absolute support of abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy that is “opposed to where( most) women stand ,” to paraphrase Damoff.

Although several polls suggest Canadians aren’t itching to re- open the abortion debate, some of those same polls reveal that most Canadians mistakenly believe abortion is already restricted to the first trimester. When asked more precise questions, the majority of Canadians take issue with Canada’s complete lack of legal restrictions. According to a 2011 Abacus Data poll, 59 per cent believe that human life should be legally protected in some way before birth. Sixty per cent are in favour of restricting abortion to only the first and second trimesters, according to a June 2012 Ipsos- Reid survey. And a 2013 Environics poll indicated 65 per cent of Canadians think abortion should be illegal by the third trimester.

As to Rachael Harder’s “voting record,” she was one of the co- sponsors of the Molly and Cassie Law, a grassroots effort initiated by a pro-choice widower, following the murder of his wife Cassie and their nearly full- term baby girl. The common- ground bill would have additional punishments for a person who robs a woman and family of their chosen and wanted fetus. Although the bill died in parliament after being misconstrued as a threat to abortion, a 2007 Environics poll nevertheless found that 72 per cent of Canadians, and 75 per cent of women specifically, support such measures. Here again, the Liberal MPs are out of step with most Canadian women.

Damoff also decried Harder for having asked a question of the Status of Women’s Minister Maryam Monsef that “had to do with abortion.” What Damoff neglected to tell her audience was that the question Harder had asked was with regard to gender discrimination, and whether sex- selective targeting of female fetuses ( brought to light in a 2012 Canadian Medical Association report) ought to qualify as such. According to a 2011 Environics poll, a whopping 92 per cent of Canadians believe sex- selection abortions should be illegal. Liberal MPs like Pam Damoff and Maryam Monsef are the exception in thinking that a woman’s reproductive choice trumps the rights of foetuses to not be killed just because they are female.

“We don’t want women in Canada to be going backward,” Damoff also said. “This was something that was decided years ago by the Supreme Court of Canada and we think that says it all.”

Damoff is wrong about that too. Although the Supreme Court did rule in 1988 that a criminal l aw that prohibited abortion was unconstitutional, their judgment did not indicate that they intended to leave Canada with a permanent legislative void, or to grant abortion on demand in all three trimesters.

The opposite is true. All five Supreme Court judges who ruled against the old law argued that it was the mandate of parliamentary legislatures to create a new law that would better protect the interests of older fetuses while maintaining women’s rights.

Even Madam Justi c e Bertha Wilson ( who was considered the most liberal of the justices on the bench at the time) suggested the state’s interest in protecting the fetus may become “compelling… somewhere in the second trimester.”

The f act that Rachael Harder holds views on abortion that differ from those of most Liberals does not in any way negate her ability to work as a committee chair toward progress for women. There is more to women’s rights than abortion.

Harder was chosen by the Conservative leader in accordance with a democratic process — one that Liberal MPs should not be permitted to thwart simply because they disagree with Harder ( and most Canadians’) position that women should not be able to access abortion through all nine months of a pregnancy. Kristine Kruszelnicki is the Founder and Executive Director of Pro- Life Humanists.

WE DON’T WANT WOMEN IN CANADA TO BE GOING BACKWARD.