Conservative bill on prenatal and postnatal care in B.C. a rare opportunity for bipartisan co-operation

B.C. Conservative MLA Jody Toor is on the verge of accomplishing a rare feat: getting an opposition private member’s bill passed in the legislature.

There have only been three non-government private member’s bills passed this century, all of which were proposed by then-Green leader Andrew Weaver in 2019 under his party’s confidence-and-supply agreement with the NDP.

Toor’s bill, which aims to improve prenatal and postnatal care, would give the provincial government a year to craft a strategy to expand mental health care for new mothers throughout the province.

It has received broad bipartisan support from all sides of the house and passed second reading almost unanimously with 91 votes in favour, including one from NDP Esquimalt-Colwood MLA Darlene Rotchford who gave birth to her second daughter on March 13.

Rotchford has been a vocal supporter of the bill.

She sent Toor an email thanking her for bringing it forward and spoke to her own experience struggling with finding prenatal care and experiencing postpartum depression after the birth of her first child.

“I was connected with a postpartum midwife named Rebecca. She truly was an angel. When she came to my home to check on me, I broke down, admitting for the first time that I was struggling,” said Rotchford during second reading in the house.

“That counsellor not only helped me process my birth trauma but also guided me through my transition into motherhood and all the feelings that came with it.”

Toor said she is grateful for Rotchford’s support and consensus around the bill.

“I had my own struggles of prenatal and postnatal procedures, with my own mental health challenges from infertility to isolation and just having anxiety, just being a new mother, having a new role,” Toor told Postmedia.

“I kind of suffered alone, like I didn’t really want to talk about it, because there’s stigma around it.”

She said that while services for prenatal and postnatal mental health care are available around the Lower Mainland, many mothers in rural and remote communities are forced to travel if they want support.

While the NDP government has been largely complimentary of Toor’s efforts, and it appears the bill is set to be passed within the next few weeks, there have been some questions around whether the legislation is actually needed.

Jessie Sunner, NDP MLA for Surrey-Newton, pointed out that improving maternity care is already included in Health Minister Josie Osborne’s mandate letter and that she has started to work with Perinatal Services B.C. to update the province’s current maternal care strategy.

Toor said the difference between her bill and what the government is doing is that her legislation focuses specifically on mental health care while Osborne is primarily focused on child care.

“There are many factors for breastfeeding and how to care for a child and the development of a child,” she said. “Those services are available, but my bill, and the strategy behind this bill, is prenatal and postnatal mental health strategy.”

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