On May 9, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau repeated something he has said too often. He called abortion a right. Conservative MP Ted Falk (Provencher) challenged the Prime Minister, saying “it is not a right.” The Prime Minister should know that. Campaign Life Coalition national president Jim Hughes wrote to him last fall noting the legal and constitutional facts that abortion is not a part of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, no law has ever been passed to declare abortion a right, nor has the Supreme Court of Canada recognized that abortion is a right. As Hughes explained, abortion is permitted – in a word, merely tolerated – in the absence of a law allowing abortion. But even if Canadian law or the courts sanctioned abortion as a right, there can never be a moral right to do wrong. Abortion cannot be a right, because private citizens cannot ever be allowed to take the life of an innocent human being.
Falk called out the Prime Minister and the House of Commons was aghast. NDP MP Anne Minh-Thu Quach said in response to Falk’s interjection, “what we have just heard is awful. It is a right, and everyone needs to understand that.” Later, Conservative leader Andrew Scheer was reported to have talked to Falk and the matter in the House is over for now.
The implication of Quach’s statement is that even raising the pro-life point of view should be verboten; MPs cannot hear the “awful” counter-argument against abortion. Never mind that Falk was 100 per cent correct: neither legally nor morally is abortion a right.
