Prime Minister Justin Trudeau responds to a question during question period in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Monday, June 6, 2016. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

Highlights from the news file for Monday, June 6:

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The Trudeau government doubled down Monday in defence of its proposed new law on medically assisted dying.

TRUDEAU DEFENDS ASSISTED DEATH LAW: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the medically assisted dying bill is an appropriate balance between defending the rights and freedoms of Canadians while protecting the most vulnerable. However, Canada's foremost constitutional authority has predicted it would be struck down by the courts as unconstitutional. Peter Hogg said Bill C-14 is inconsistent with last year's landmark Carter decision, which struck down the ban on assisted dying as a violation of the charter right to life, liberty and security of the person. The court suspended its ruling for a year — and later extended the deadline by four months — to give the federal government time to respond with a new law. That deadline arrived Monday, with C-14 still under examination by independent-minded senators.

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LISA RAITT URGED TO SEEK TORY LEADERSHIP: A grassroots effort is underway to persuade longtime Conservative MP Lisa Raitt to run for the Tory leadership. The Draft Lisa Raitt campaign calls itself a coalition of students, business people and public servants who want to show Raitt she has broad public support. The former cabinet minister is among several members of the Conservative caucus who are considering running to replace Stephen Harper. The party will elect a new leader in May 2017.

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SHOPPERS SEEK ALTERNATIVES TO PRICEY FRESH PRODUCE: Some Canadians are turning to frozen produce and juice as less-pricey alternatives to expensive fruits and vegetables. An online survey by the University of Guelph and Dalhousie University suggests low-income households, less-educated people and younger generations are more vulnerable to volatile fruit and vegetable prices. Sylvain Charlebois, the dean of the faculty of management at Dalhousie University in Halifax, says about one-quarter of respondents said they ate fewer fruits and vegetables over the past 12 months.

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'THREE AMIGOS' TO DISCUSS CLIMATE CHANGE, CLEAN ENERGY: A senior Canadian official says clean energy and climate policy will be a dominant theme when the leaders of Canada, the United States and Mexico meet in Ottawa late this month. But because President Barack Obama's days in office are numbered this American election year, Canada isn't pursuing any grand vision for reinvigorating the complicated three-way relationship. Canadian and American officials downplayed expectations for any big headlines out of the one-day summit at a panel discussion today.

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POSSIBLE CHARGES IN DEATH OF PREMATURE BABY: There have been no arrests, but Toronto police are consulting with the Crown to determine whether charges could be laid in the death of a baby who was delivered prematurely last month after his mother was fatally shot. The infant son of Candice Rochelle Bobb died Sunday night in hospital. Bobb, 35, delivered the boy prematurely by emergency C-section at 24 weeks after being shot shot while returning home from watching a basketball game on May 15. Police say Bobb, who lived in neighbouring Mississauga, Ont., was in a vehicle with three other people at the time of the shooting.

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FINAL ARGUMENTS IN B.C. TERROR TRIAL: Closing arguments are underway in B.C. Supreme Court over whether a couple found guilty of plotting to bomb the provincial legislature on Canada Day three years ago was manipulated by police. John Nuttall and Amanda Korody were found guilty of conspiring to commit a terrorist act last June. The judge put the convictions on hold to allow the pair's lawyers to argue their clients were victims of entrapment. Nuttall's lawyer, Marilyn Sandford, says police took it upon themselves to provide spiritual guidance and did so in a way that dismissed the concerns her client repeatedly raised over committing violence in the name of Islam.

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YOUTH SUICIDES RAISE CONCERNS: Police in Woodstock, Ont., say five young people have taken their own lives since the beginning of the year. The police chief says in the same time frame, 36 people have expressed suicidal thoughts or attempted suicide in Oxford County, which includes Woodstock and seven neighbouring communities. An official of the Canadian Mental Health Association is calling it a "suicide contagion." The organization's executive director for Oxford County says there's been an upswing in the number of calls to its crisis line since late February, when the first of five young people died by suicide.

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BOOMERS IN LINE TO INHERIT BILLIONS: Canada's baby boomers are expected to inherit $750 billion over the next 10 years. CIBC says currently there are about 2.5-million Canadians over the age of 75 with a combined net worth of $900 billion dollars or more. The bank says over the past decade, the average inheritance received by the 50-75 age group was $180,000, but it will likely increase in coming years because of the increased value of assets — especially homes.

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MOTHER OF BOY IN GORILLA CASE WON'T BE CHARGED: No charges will be laid against the mother of a three-year-old boy who managed to climb into the Cincinnati Zoo's gorilla exhibit last month. Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters says the mom had three other children with her, and she was attending to them when the three-year-old "just scampered off." A special response team shot and killed the 17-year-old western lowland gorilla named Harambe in order to protect the boy.

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REPUBLICANS SCOLD TRUMP OVER JUDGE COMMENTS: Republicans roundly scolded their own presidential candidate Monday, demanding Donald Trump apologize for — and just stop — talking about the ethnic background and impartiality of the American judge overseeing a lawsuit against Trump University. Leading the roll call were two formal rivals for the Republican presidential nomination. Ohio Gov. John Kasich tweeted that Trump's offensive against the impartiality of U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel "is flat-out wrong." Trump, Kasich wrote, should "apologize to Judge Curiel & try to unite this country."

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FLORIDA DECLARES EMERGENCY AS TROPICAL STORM COLIN APPROACHES: Residents on Florida's Gulf coast filled sandbags, schools closed early and graduation ceremonies were postponed as Gov. Rick Scott declared a state of emergency with Tropical Storm Colin churning toward the state Monday, threatening serious flooding. A large portion of Florida's western and Panhandle coast was already under a tropical storm warning when the National Hurricane Center announced that a swift-moving depression had become a named storm. The centre said it is the earliest that a third named storm has ever formed in the Atlantic basin. Sandbags also were being distributed in Tampa and nearby cities.

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News from © The Canadian Press, 2016