Saskatchewan Conservative MP Cathay Wagantall introduced a Private Member’s Bill in Parliament last week to extend legal protection to pre-born children when they are hurt or killed in the commission of a criminal offence against their pregnant mother. The proposal comes in response to the Molly Matters campaign out of Windsor, Ontario. On the feature this week, we speak with Mike Schouten from We Need a Law about the specifics of the proposal.

In the news, the Joint Commons/Senate Committee on Physician-Assisted Dying released its final report last week. The report makes 21 recommendations to Parliament as it gets set to craft a new law in response to the Supreme Court’s decision last year to strike down a section of the Criminal Code that outlawed doctor-assisted suicide. ARPA lawyer André Schutten says it’s clear that the “animating force behind the Committee’s recommendations was not protecting vulnerable people, but (rather) to make sure that anyone who wants access to assisted death can have it.” The full report is available here.  

And Cardus has released a report entitled “Banking on the Margins“. It’s the result of an extensive study of Canada’s so-called pay-day loan industry, and recommends some alternatives to help low-income Canadians get through periodic cash-flow problems without having to resort to extremely high-interest short-term borrowing.