As soon as formalized, the revocation by the United States Supreme Court of the Roe v. Wade judgment which guaranteed the right to abortion led to a flood of denunciatory comments from the political class in Canada.
Posted at 12:21 p.m.
Updated at 2:08 p.m.
What you need to know
- The United States Supreme Court has ruled that there is no constitutional right to abortion.
- With the decision Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organizationthe court with a conservative majority overturned the judgment Roe v. wadea landmark 1973 case that guaranteed American women’s right to abortion.
- “The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and none of its articles implicitly protects this right,” wrote Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. “It is time to return the issue of abortion to the elected representatives of the people” in local parliaments.
- Following this reversal, states will therefore once again be allowed to prohibit or severely restrict abortion. A total of 26 states are expected to ban the practice.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the news “horrifying.”
“We must remember that we cannot take our rights for granted, even fundamental rights,” he said in a press scrum from Kigali, Rwanda. We must always be there to watch, to fight, to defend the rights and freedoms of all. »
Alongside his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mélanie Joly, he promised to defend the right to abortion in Canada and to ensure access to it.
“Today is a dark day for women in the United States, but also [celles] everywhere around the world because it is a step back for generations of women who fought for the right to abortion,” added Ms.me Pretty.
Earlier, Mr. Trudeau had declared on Twitter that “no government, no politician, or no man should dictate to a woman what she can or cannot do with her body”.
On the same social network, the Premier of Quebec François Legault deplored a “sad setback for the rights and freedoms of women”.
Its Minister for the Status of Women, Isabelle Charest, maintained that she was “wholeheartedly with American women who see their right to abortion threatened”.
“In Quebec, we will never let this right be called into question,” she added.
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante added, also via Twitter, that she was “outraged”. “This decision is an unacceptable setback. Let us denounce it forcefully and vigorously, here as elsewhere. »
On the federal scene, the leader of the New Democratic Party, Jagmeet Singh, also criticized a “devastating decision [qui] will cost the lives of many women”.
He took advantage of a written statement to reiterate his request to the Trudeau government to do more to ensure better access to abortion across Canada.
“In many parts of the country, especially in rural communities, women have to travel hundreds of kilometers to access the care they need. This is unacceptable,” Singh said.
The interim leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, Candice Bergen, for her part, believes that Justin Trudeau’s Liberals are “importing issues from the United States in order to divide Canadians”.
“I have been clear that our position remains what it has been since the Harper government,” she said in a written statement. Access to abortion has not been restricted under Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and the Conservative Party will not introduce a bill or reopen the debate on abortion. »
On this subject, Mr.me Instead, Joly said the Conservatives tried to reopen the abortion debate last year, while warning against party leadership candidates who “shop around” for support among anti-abortion members.
In the ranks of the opposition parties in the National Assembly, the leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec, Dominique Anglade, denounced an “unnamed decline”.
“We must continue to fight so that our daughters always have more rights than us, not less,” she said on social networks.
Parti Québécois leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon called the news “sad” as well as a “worrying setback for women’s human rights” on Twitter. He sees it as a “reminder of the fragility of achievements, which we must always seek to protect”.
Its women’s spokesperson, Méganne Perry Mélançon, warned that Friday’s decision “could have consequences far beyond the borders of the United States” and argued that “Quebec must never allow any backsliding. “.
In a telephone interview, Québec solidaire co-spokesperson Manon Massé said she was “really shocked” and “worried about American women”. She recalled that all was not won in Quebec, citing among other things the difficulties of access to services in more isolated communities. “I think the government needs to give us a full picture” of the situation, she said, to identify and address weaknesses in the system.
Quebec Solidarity MNA Ruba Ghazal expressed her “solidarity with American women”. “Lesson for us: we must always remain vigilant, our rights are never acquired,” she said.
For its part, the Quebec Federation for Planned Births (FQPN) says it welcomes this announcement with great disappointment and concern. “The FQPN fears that this decision will have an impact on sexual and reproductive health rights around the world and will galvanize the conservative and anti-choice movement already present in Quebec,” she said in a press release.
The influence of the United States on Canada
“We know that illegal abortion will continue and it will be the women who will suffer and die from it,” lamented the head of the abortion file at the Quebec Federation for Family Planning (FQPN), Jess Legault.
She is also wary of “the cultural and political influence” that the United States could have on Canada and Quebec.
Already, “there are three regions in Quebec where there is only one point of service […] there is also the College of Physicians which limits access to medical abortion by placing restrictions on who can prescribe it” and several “anti-choice” centers pose as help resources and “spread false information to scare women,” she argued. “If a Conservative government is elected in a province, it could put up additional barriers,” she said.
The FQPN is organizing a demonstration on Sunday against the revocation of the Roe c. Wade.
“The idea that a court can take away something so fundamental” is “devastating” news for the director of the fundamental freedoms program at the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, Cara Zwibel. On the other hand, according to her, the anti-abortion movement remains marginal in Canada. His organization is currently taking part in a legal battle for the accessibility of abortion in New Brunswick, where only three hospitals offer this service in the public sector.
Public Affairs Officer for Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights, Insiya Mankani, added that while “abortion is well protected under the Canada Health Act,” events south of the border risk breathe new life into anti-abortion groups. She called on the federal government to strengthen the health law and the obligation to apply it in each province.
With Alice Girard-Bossé and Henri Ouellette-Vézina, The Press