If Justin Trudeau’s continued high polling performance isn’t enough to cause a chill among those looking to lead the Conservative Party of Canada, they can always take a glance at the party’s social conservative flank — not so subtly reminding the base that they still exist.

It started last May in Vancouver when a motion to delete the party’s antiquated definition of marriage as the union of one man to one woman refused to go away quietly. Now rookie Saskatchewan Member of Parliament Cathay Wagantall is promoting C-225, better known as ‘Cassie and Molly’s Law’, which seems to be a deliberate attempt to reopen the debate on fetal rights.

The legislation, if passed, would make it a separate offence to cause injury or death to a pre-born child during an assault on the child’s mother. The bill, tabled in February, is named after Cassandra Kaake, who was seven months’ pregnant when she was murdered by arson in Windsor, Ontario in 2014.

Compared to previous failed attempts at giving legal protection to the unborn, this bill uses rather provocative language.

In 2010, Rod Bruinooge promoted “Roxanne’s Law”, which would have made it an offence to coerce a woman into terminating a pregnancy. In 2012, Stephen Woodworth tabled a motion for the House to study the question of when a “child becomes a human being”.

‘Roxanne’s law’ does not use the word “child”, except in the definition section. Woodworth’s motion simply called on the House to review a legal question. I voted against ‘Roxanne’s Law’ because threats and coercion already attract legal sanction, whether the victim is pregnant or not. I supported Woodworth’s motion in part because of its innocuous wording — but mostly because the Whip’s office and PMO desperately wanted to shut it down.

C-225 takes a far more direct approach. The short title of the bill is “The Protection of Pregnant Women and Their Unborn Children Act (Cassie and Molly’s Law)”. The language the bill uses — unborn child, unborn children, ‘preborn’ children — directly and deliberately blurs the distinction between a child born alive, which our criminal law protects, and a fetus, which it does not.

Molly was apparently the name Cassandra Kaake had chosen for her yet-to-be-born child. Including it in the title of the bill is a blatant attempt to personify the unborn.

I suspect Ambrose’s inability to keep this divisive matter out of her caucus meetings has less to do with her own personal convictions than it does with her lame-duck leadership. I suspect Ambrose’s inability to keep this divisive matter out of her caucus meetings has less to do with her own personal convictions than it does with her lame-duck leadership.

It gets even more provocative. Under C-225, if you cause harm to someone you know is pregnant and you directly or indirectly “cause the death of her preborn child”, you are liable upon conviction to a life sentence and a minimum mandatory sentence of ten years in prison.

There are obvious constitutional problems with the concept of a minimum mandatory sentence. But it can’t be a coincidence that the penalty for both first and second-degree murder is imprisonment for life — and that the minimum parole eligibility for second-degree murder is ten years.

(C-225 does contain one mostly workable provision. It would make an accused’s knowledge that the victim was pregnant an aggravating factor in sentencing. That’s sensible — and it would not re-open the abortion debate. It merely reflects the circumstance of the victim.)

Undoubtedly, the author’s real intent is to elevate the status of the unborn to that of any other person under the law. If this law should pass (it won’t — it doesn’t stand a chance) it undoubtedly would amount to a victory for the anti-abortion movement — which would thereafter use the precedent as a stepping-stone to further advance the legal rights of the unborn.

When Stephen Harper was in charge, a bill this provocative probably wouldn’t even get tabled, much less debated. Harper knew very well that Canadians have no appetite for re-opening this debate — and letting Canada remain one of the very few countries with absolutely no legal restrictions on abortion was always more politically palatable than the alternative.

But when the cat is away (as a private sector consultant), the mice will play.

Interim CPC Leader Rona Ambrose’s voting record indicates at least some support for socially conservative causes; she voted in favour of Woodworth’s Motion 312, for example. But I suspect her inability to keep this divisive matter out of her caucus meetings has less to do with her own personal convictions than it does with her lame-duck leadership. It’s unlikely she has enough political capital to steer Conservative MPs away from lost social causes.

And this bill is a lost cause. Roxanne’s Law failed when the Conservatives had a plurality of MPs. Wordworth’s motion failed when they had a majority (almost all support for both initiatives came from the Conservative benches). With the Conservatives reduced to less than 100 MPs, Wagantall’s bill is doomed and I’m sure she knows it. Which explains why she apparently feels no need to be subtle with the bill’s language. What’s the point in watering it down when the bill’s dead in the water?

The law of unintended consequences means she is likely creating an unenviable problem for her next leader. We live in a world where everything politicians say and do is preserved forever, and anything done by a member of the team is assumed to be team policy.

I understand the Liberals are using extracts from Kellie Leitch’s pitch to start testing immigrants for “Canadian values” in their fundraising letters. The other parties will be all too eager to remind Canadians that certain Conservative MPs want to take away a woman’s right to control her own body. The harm this bill seeks to prevent — an involuntary termination of a pregnancy — doesn’t fit well into a seven-second soundbite. Which makes it irrelevant, politically.

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