The tough-on-crime Conservative cabinet is taking a hands-off approach to a Diamond Jubilee medal being awarded to a repeat offender jailed for harassing women over abortion.
Saskatchewan Conservative backbencher Maurice Vellacott has won kudos from the anti-abortion community for recommending that jailed antiabortion crusader Mary Wagner be commended for her "civil disobedience to further a just cause."
Vellacott also recommended a medal for Linda Gibbons, who has been charged repeatedly for encroaching on abortion clinics and harassing staff and patients.
Wagner, 38, is in jail in Toronto, awaiting trial after entering a clinic in August. In March, she was convicted of a similar offence when she attempted to force her way into a Toronto clinic's private treatment area last November.
Court documents show Wagner has four similar convictions dating back to 2000 in Vancouver.
Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said he is very happy to have awarded Diamond Jubilee medals to victims of crime.
A statement from Vellacott's office said the MP couldn't award medals "to the victims of crime, because these baby victims are dead." Instead, he chose Wagner and Gibbons, calling them "heroines of humanity."
Bob Rae, the Liberals' interim leader, called it "bizarre, in my view, to be giving medals to people who are in jail for harassment or for causing mischief or for breaking probation."
