Winnipeg backs down from pro-abortion ‘bubble zone’ law after group threatens legal action

WINNIPEG, Manitoba (LifeSiteNews) – The Canadian city of Winnipeg backed down from putting in place a new bylaw that would have banned demonstrations in front of schools, hospitals, and churches after legal pressure.

In a press release sent to LifeSiteNews, the Canadian Constitution Foundation (CCF) recently noted that it “welcomes news” that the Winnipeg officials’ draft of a bubble zone bylaw has been “shelved.”

The Winnipeg law was titled the “Safe Access to Vulnerable Infrastructure” bylaw, and according to the CCF, would have “banned many types of in-person demonstrations within 100 metres of schools, hospitals, places of worship, and other facilities.”

Fines would have ranged from $500 to $5,000 for repeat violations.

The irony is that the bylaw put in place an exception for certain exempted union and labor-related protest activities.

As a result, CCF legal counsel Alexander Surgenor warned in a recent letter to Winnipeg Mayor Scott Gillingham and the city council that the “bylaw violated sections 2(b) and 2(c) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and that the CCF would pursue litigation if it went forward.”

On Monday, Councillor Evan Duncan “announced the proposal will be received as information and not advanced,” the CCF said.

CCF executive director Christine Van Geyn warned that Winnipeg’s proposed bylaw was part of a dangerous trend of new laws similar to the federal Bill C-9.

“Creating new speech crimes is not the right solution to every social problem, especially when intimidation and harassment are already illegal under the Criminal Code,” she said.

“The CCF opposes Bill C-9 for these same reasons. We encourage the City of Winnipeg to drop this bylaw outright, and never pick it back up.”

In Surgenor’s letter to Gillingham and the city council, he wrote that the bylaw would “have transformed large portions of Winnipeg into selectively enforced protest-free zones and punished peaceful Canadians with fines simply for expressing their views.”

“That is fundamentally incompatible with the Charter, and we are pleased that this deeply flawed bylaw has been halted and hope it will be abandoned fully,” he added.

Despite the bylaw being shelved, the far-left Manitoba government last year officially enacted “buffer zones” around abortion clinics to restrict pro-life activism.