FREDERICTON, New Brunswick, May 20, 2014 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Almost half of New Brunswick’s legislative assembly — 24 out of 55 MLAs — rallied at the province’s annual March for Life last Thursday to defy national pressure exerted by the abortion lobby to begin funding the abortion in private clinics.
The abortion lobby called the head count an “alarming number to be sure.” They responded by organizing a twitter campaign targeting the legislative members who came out publicly to support the pro-life marchers. It began today.
“We know what we’re up against, because they showed up in public to support the status quo,” NB Choice said about its campaign.
The Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada endorsed the campaign, stating on its Facebook page that the MLAs need to be called to account for “abusing their elected position to express and impose their personal views.”
The Morgentaler Clinic in Fredericton announced last month that it will be closing its doors in July due to financial reasons. Local pro-lifers immediately suspected the move to be a ploy to garner sympathy for public funding. While abortion is covered at taxpayers’ expense in two of the province’s hospitals, it is not covered at the province’s single private Morgentaler Clinic, where aborting an unborn baby up to 16 weeks gestation would cost a mother about $850.
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“Our position of government is to fund medically necessary health services in public health facilities,” Post-Secondary Education, Training and Labour Minister Jody Carr told the pro-life crowd at the rally that on behalf of premier David Alward. “In our province, we do not fund private clinics. This has been the position held by successive governments.”
Carr assured the crowd that “this position will not change for the Progressive Conservative party of New Brunswick.”
Last month the province’s Liberal Party flip-flopped on its previous policy on abortion and caved into the abortion lobby, approving a resolution calling for taxpayer-funded abortion at private facilities.
Carr also stated that the party will support the status quo of funding abortion in public hospitals. “At the same time our position insures that the government meets our obligations and responsibilities to provide medically necessary abortions in public health care facilities,” he said amidst boos from the crowd.
Peter Ryan, New Brunswick Right to Life Association’s executive director, told LifeSiteNews that the almost two dozen PC MLAs present at the event signifies that the ruling government will not cave to pressure to fund abortion-on-demand.
Ryan said that the fact that about 800 people showed up for the March — twice as many as last year — shows that many New Brunswickers oppose the proposed policy change.
“Publicly funded abortion-on-demand would be tremendously harmful for our province. It would bring large loss of life for children, and a large and negative impact on women’s health,” he said. “If such policy were adopted, it could be expected, based on the experience in other provinces, that New Brunswick’s abortion rate would escalate sharply. Instead of 1,000 abortions annually as at present, we’d have 1,700 or even 2,000.”
Ryan believes that New Brunswickers are not buying the abortion lobby’s argument. “Each abortion means a child killed; a statement not of religious belief but medical fact. The death of 2,000 children a year would represent an enormous tragedy,” he said. “It is with good reason that most New Brunswickers do not wish to move in that direction.”
Group e-mail list of MLAs targeted by abortion lobby for being at the pro-life rally: