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consider the impact on families of these decisions by Canadian governments and courts in the past year!
OCTOBER
Former elementary school principal and admitted homosexual William Bennest received a suspended sentence in Burnaby, BC, plus two years probation after pleading guilty to possessing child pornography. Parents are outraged at the leniency of the sentence. According to police, Bennest had been paying a procurer $100 for sexual encounters with boys as young as 14 and that he had offered $400 if even younger children could be found. The co-chair of the parents advisory council at the school where Bennest was principal for 12 years says parents are having difficulty explaining to their children why Bennest is not in jail.
DECEMBER
Although convicted of murdering his severely disabled daughter, Robert Latimer was sentenced to only a year in jail and a year’s probation on his farm. Meanwhile, the Justice Minister, who was raised on a farm and loves dogs, appears more concerned about getting tough with people who abuse animals. “I think we should deal with these people very harshly, she told the press. “I cannot understand the mentality of an individual who would take advantage of another living being or thing that cannot defend itself.“
FEBRUARY
The signatures of 100,000 concerned Canadians have so far failed to persuade Justice Minister Anne MacLellan that the federal government should intervene to again make it a crime for Ontario women to appear topless in public. A petition containing 60,000 names was tabled in The House of Commons, urging the government to amend the indecent act and public nudity provisions of the Criminal Code. MacLellan, on the other hand, feels there’s a better approach. “This is an issue that in many respects can be dealt with within local communities,“ she said.
FEBRUARY
Abortionists and their supporters across the country celebrated with champagne the tenth anniversary of the Supreme Court ruling that left Canada without any law governing abortion. At the centre of the celebrations was Henry Morgenthaler. His lengthy battle with governments and courts was ultimately responsible for a state of affairs in which, according to Statistics Canada, 106,658 unborn children were aborted in 1995 alone, for a total since 1970 of 1.8 million abortions. Yet, as Morgenthaler sees it, Canada has still a long way to go before true abortion-on-demand becomes a reality. He wants the federal Health Minister to pressure all the provinces to cover the full cost of abortions. “Abortion,” he contends, “is a medically necessary service which should be available everywhere.“
JUNE
The federal government has apparently given up the legal fight to preserve the traditional definition of “spouse” by deciding not to appeal o the Supreme Court of Canada the Rosenberg decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal. That unanimous court ruling not only threw out as discriminatory the opposite-sex definition of “spouse” in the federal Income Tax Act. It also ordered that a new definition that embraces same-sex partners be immediately “read in.”
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