NDP introduces bill to prohibit protests outside hospitals

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/10/2021 (1718 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba NDP introduced a new private member’s bill on Friday which would prohibit anti-vaccine mandate advocates from demonstrating directly outside of hospitals, COVID-19 testing centres and vaccination injection sites if passed.

According to the measures laid out in Bill 239, titled “Protest Buffer Zone Act,” protesters who come within 50 to 150 metres of any of these facilities could face a variety of legal repercussions, from a $5,000 fine to a year in jail.

Protest exclusion zones would also be created outside educational institutions and child-care centres, as well as the residences of health-care workers.

NDP justice critic Nahanni Fontaine formally introduced this new bill on Friday, and told the Sun it is a direct response to the country-wide protests that emerged on Sept. 1, where anti-vaccine mandate demonstrators gathered outside of hospitals all over Canada.

This includes Winnipeg’s Health Sciences Centre, where protesters slowed traffic and confronted people as they tried to enter the building.

Fontaine described these events as a “kick to the gut” and profoundly disrespectful to the health-care workers and patients who are still under tremendous strain 19 months into the COVID-19 pandemic.

“You can protest all you want, but those individuals got in the way of citizens accessing health care,” she said over the phone. “Those individuals got in the way of those Manitobans that are on the front lines, actually saving anti-vaxxers’ lives.”

Winnipeg wasn’t the only Canadian city to deal with this kind of disruption throughout September, with similar protests taking place outside of hospitals from Vancouver to Toronto.

Even Brandon hosted its own anti-vaccine mandate demonstration on Sept. 1, although this group of around 100 people did not get that close to the Brandon Regional Health Centre.

Still, because of these events, government officials in British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec and Alberta are all introducing or in the middle of passing legislation that would crack down on these kinds of protests in some capacity.

Fontaine believes it is about time for Manitoba to follow suit, especially with the fourth wave of the pandemic already underway in the province.

“We have a responsibility as legislators to protect those individuals, to protect citizens who are trying to access health care and protect citizens who work in health care or in a variety of different fronts,” she said over the phone.

The MLA for St. Johns also told the Sun that she doesn’t view this bill as an infringement on Manitobans’ freedom of speech, stating they are more than welcome to protest outside of the Manitoba Legislature or any other government building of that nature.

“You are more than welcome to come to the Leg,” she said. “We’ll put out the welcome sign for you. This is where protests need to happen, not at hospitals. That’s irresponsible, it’s selfish and it’s quite disrespectful.”

Interim Premier Kelvin Goertzen told reporters on Friday that he wants to thoroughly read through the bill before voicing his opinion, since he wants to make sure the measures outlined in the bill don’t go too far.

“There are often unintended consequences of legislation … so before we take any action on this particular issue, we’d want to make sure that we’re doing due diligence on the bill itself,” Goertzen said.

During the winter of 2020, the Progressive Conservative Party put forward Bill 57 — the Protection of Critical Infrastructure Act — which would have allowed the operators of pipeline developments, food-production centres, financial institutions and other facilities like that to obtain a court order for a similar protest buffer zone.

Bill 57 was one of five controversial pieces of legislation the PCs withdrew this week following much opposition from the NDP.

However, Fontaine views her new bill as being “entirely different,” saying Bill 57 was specifically designed to crack down on Indigenous demonstrators trying to protest what they saw as government-sanctioned environmental degradation.

“If you understand the history of Bill 57, you’ll understand that Brian Pallister and the PCs constructed that bill in February of 2020 in response to land defenders across the country protecting the environment,” she said.

“There’s a fundamental difference between land protectors protecting the environment and anti-vaxxers who don’t believe in science, protesting in front of a hospital.”

The “Protest Buffer Zone Act” isn’t the only piece of legislation that Fontaine has introduced to try and protect health-care workers from protesters.

Over the past couple years, the St. Johns MLA has attempted to get a similar bill off the ground that prevents demonstrators from picketing around facilities that provide abortion services.

While the bill was voted down several times by the PCs, Fontaine told the Sun that a new version of this legislation — Bill 207, the Abortion Protest Buffer Zone Act — is finally going to a vote in the legislature on Thursday.

The NDP justice critic said her party will approach passing Bill 239 with the same kind of tenacity in the hopes of ensuring that Manitobans can safely access health care on multiple fronts.

“It’s my hope that they will pass,” she said. “It’s my hope that the PC government would do what’s in the best interest of Manitobans and protecting Manitobans’ right to access health care without being intimidated, harassed or molested on the way into a provider.”

— with files from the Winnipeg Free Press

» kdarbyson@brandonsun.com

» Twitter:@KyleDarbyson