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OTTAWA, Ontario, September 2, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Pro-life Canadians have complained for years that they are forced to pay for the direct killing of unborn children through the country’s health system.  It turns out they are also paying for abortive mothers to get full maternity benefits.

Canada’s employment insurance guidelines reveal that a woman who aborts her child after 19 weeks gestation is eligible to receive 17 weeks of maternity leave, the same as a mother who gives birth.  For an abortion occurring before 19 weeks gestation, the woman can collect sick leave for the same length of time.

“The whole situation is pretty ludicrous,” said Mary Ellen Douglas, national organizer for Campaign Life Coalition.  “Why should you pay for somebody killing their child, and then expect to pay for benefits if the child is no longer there?”

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation first highlighted this federal policy in 2008.  John Williamson, CTF’s executive director, told The Interim that maternity benefits were established by an Act of Parliament with the intention of allowing parents bonding time with their newborn child.

He said extending these benefits to a woman who aborted her child is “obscene” and a “perversion of the EI system.”

Campagne Quebec-Vie, the Quebec division of Campaign Life Coalition, has recently highlighted that women are also given maternity benefits under the Quebec Parental Insurance Plan.

“How is it fair that I am being asked, along with other taxpayers of good will, to not only pay for the assassination of a ‘less than perfect’ child, but that I am also paying for several months’ ‘maternity leave’?” asked Georges Buscemi, CQV’s president.

Buscemi warned Americans that they could be facing similar policies if President Barack Obama, the country’s most pro-abortion head-of-state in history, is elected a second time.  “Not only is this the kind of nonsense that greatly in-debts states, these socialist policies are nothing but a kind of barbarism hidden under a cloak of charity and compassion. These kinds of policies are both expensive and evil,” said Buscemi.

Federal government regulations note that a woman who obtained an abortion would not be eligible for parental leave, which is above and beyond maternity leave, “since the employee must have actual care and custody of a newborn child.”

Douglas said abortion is not a “maternal” act and so should not warrant any maternity benefits.  “Families are not taking care of their children if they’re eliminating them,” she said.  “That’s not caring for children, that’s eliminating children.  So it’s not worthy of benefits for sure.”

LifeSiteNews.com did not hear back from the office of Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development Diane Finley by press time.

Contact Information:

Hon. Diane Finley
Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development
House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0A6
Phone: (613) 996-4974
Fax: (613) 996-9749
E-mail: [email protected]

Find contact information for Members of Parliament here.