Madam Speaker, I too commend my colleague from Yorkton—Melville for bringing this motion forward.
It has of course been a topic where there are deep feelings on both sides of the abortion issue. The motion specifically talks about the government bringing in legislation defining a human being as a human fetus or embryo from the moment of conception, whether in the womb of the mother or not, and whether conceived naturally or otherwise, and making any and all consequential amendments required.
I want to state my unequivocal and unqualified support for the motion and be very clear about that.
I want to take a minute or two to rebut the comments made by my colleague from the Bloc. The member for Scarborough Southwest spent some time on that as well so I will not go into great detail, but he made a good point when he said that her argument was logically inconsistent in regard to the separation issue being dealt with and that we should just leave it alone. She claimed that because the abortion issue, in her mind, has been settled and closed, we should not go there. That is logically inconsistent.
She also claimed that the opposition to this particular idea of redefining what is a human or the definition of a person is, in and of itself, one that is religious in its nature. I would disagree with that. I would say that it is a moral issue and one where individuals, who are both religious and non-religious but who are what we might call, absolutists who believe in right and wrong, would find broad agreement. Those who would say that abortion is wrong would be absolutists and I would include myself as an absolutist. I therefore reject the premise of her argument that it is simply a religious argument for those who speak against abortion.
A very big dilemma in this whole issue of abortion has to do with the definition of a human being. My colleagues have talked about the legal definition. It is in statute right now that a human is a human when the person leaves the birth canal. That creates a dilemma for many of us specifically because of the technology and advancement within our world in terms of medical sciences.
We know that in one room we may have a doctor performing microsurgery with the latest technology to save the life of what some may call a fetus, an unborn child who might be six months in its development, while in the very next room we might have somebody else in a very similar situation having the termination of a pregnancy or an abortion. That is a big dilemma. How do we explain that? How do we deal with that?
On the one hand, we are seeing medical dollars allocated to saving the life of an unborn child through microsurgery and, on the other hand, in the next room a child is being aborted. That has been a great dilemma for people who are both pro-choice and pro-life.
We could have agreement from many pro-choice individuals and pro-life people, people who would identify themselves as such, that in terms of partial birth abortions, or late term abortions, that we should look at redefining the definition of a human. We must scale it back, or as my colleague says, scale it forward.
The debate is, when does life begin. I believe life begins at conception. Many members in this place believe that. That is the fundamental question, the philosophical debate that we have around the issue. It does get very emotional.
We would do well to try and strip away as best we can those emotional catch phrases, in many ways similar to the kinds of partisan debates that can take place in the House on many different issues. We must remove that aspect in the debate and have reasoned debate taking into account the technologies that are available and that our understanding has changed from when this practice of abortion became commonplace in the sixties and throughout the seventies. We must re-examine the question and it is only fair that we re-examine it.
Yes, it has been dealt with previously, but does that mean that because we have made a decision on something, we cannot go back and open it up?
My Bloc colleague also said she was speaking for her party. I think that was a mistake because I know she has colleagues that would identify themselves as pro-life. This being private members' business, it is good for members to state their positions. We have individuals in our caucus that are both pro-life and pro-choice, and I think that would be the case for all parties. We should talk about the issue and open up the debate.
As a man, individuals have asked me why I feel I have the right to even speak on this particular issue. As a man, I am also the husband of a wife. There are a lot of women in my life but just one wife whom I love dearly. I am the father of three beautiful daughters, the uncle of eight beautiful nieces and the son to a mother. I have many other close friends who are women.
I have two very close friends who had abortions earlier on in their lives. They have reflected many years later on that experience. One was put in the position of being with an abusive husband who forced her to go through with this particular act, and she did. The second time she became pregnant, she was being forced to do again. However, she left her husband and gave birth to a son. There are countless stories of individuals who have been put in that situation.
Another friend had an abortion at a very young age. She told me she wished she had received counsel on this particular issue before embarking on this choice.
There are other solutions and other things that we can look at. Some say it is wrong to force a woman to remain pregnant. There is another possible solution for those women who find themselves in an unfortunate circumstance, and that is adoption. Abortion is one possible solution but so is adoption. I have many friends who are adopted.
We are losing generations of children every year. There are 100,000 children a year who will not walk with us in this world, who will not be able to contribute to our society and who will not be the doctors, the lawyers, the scholars, the workers and the people across the strata of our society. That is an issue we need to examine.
When we make a decision to end a child's life, are we making a decision to end the life of someone who might have a great and profound impact on our society? Each and every life is important. Each and every life will have a profound impact the child's family of course but also within a greater sphere as well in their lives.
I wrap up my comments by saying that I support the motion. We need to approach this topic in a reasoned and rational way. We need to bring forward the knowledge that we received from the great science and technology advancements in our society. We need to work together, even individuals who disagree on this particular topic. We should look for some common ground. We can start by redefining life at an earlier stage. I think pro-life and pro-choice people would have a broad consensus on the issue of partial birth abortion.
It is a worthwhile motion. It is one that is emotional but it is worthwhile because it is the definition of life, which is the most important question in all of our entire lives.