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For Democrats to reduce women to beggars for cheap government-funded birth control is demeaning to the women that I know who are far more complicated than their libido and the management of their reproductive system.

I have received so many messages of support from across the country - women and men speaking out because they agree that contraception needs to be treated as a basic health care service.

The public likes to think that women only care about contraception.

If the Democrats want to insult women by making them believe that they are helpless without Uncle Sugar coming in and providing for them a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of the government, then so be it.

I deeply believe - and not just as a matter of politics, but even as a matter of morality - that matters about reproduction and intimacy and relationships and contraception are in the personal realm. They're moral decisions for individuals to make for themselves. And the last thing we need is government intruding into those personal decisions.

I come to urge my party to be open to debate and discussion; to move away from a lock-step litmus test which advocates abortion on demand in an effort to reach a broader national consensus.

I have consistently supported laws ensuring women are able to make their own health care decisions, and I will continue to protect women's access to contraceptives and reproductive health care.

I don't know what these Republican congressmen drink that make them experts on women's reproductive health.

I do see women voters shifting to the Republican Party and doing so significantly. And the issue that's doing this is the fear the federal government will prevail in making the Affordable Health Care Act permanent law and how that will hurt small businesses.

In 2012, the Liberal Party affirmed overwhelmingly at the policy convention that we are a pro-choice party. It means that we are a party that defends women's rights, and therefore, it would be inconsistent for any Liberal MP to be able to vote to take away women's rights.