A Nova Scotia MP is planning on introducing a bill that would prohibit the sale of dead veterans' war medals to keep them from disappearing into the private collections of foreign bidders.

Thirteen veterans turned out in Halifax Wednesday to support the Halifax-area New Democrat Peter Stoffer's bid to make the sales illegal.

Stoffer's move comes after Canadians raised $300,000 to keep a British collector from purchasing a Victoria Cross, The Halifax Chronicle-Herald reported. He plans to introduce the bill in February.

"The medals that the men and women wear are not currency,'' Stoffer said Wednesday.

Although there is already a law in place preventing surviving veterans from selling their war treasures, families are permitted to do what they please with inherited medals.

Stoffer says his initiative would bring more medals to museums and schools and keep them out of the flea markets and websites that the collectors frequent.

"When I spoke to a lot of veterans, they felt very angry over that. That is not a way for them to be remembered," Stoffer said of the medals on sale.

The Victoria Cross that Canadians raised money for was awarded to paratrooper Cpl. Fred Topham near the end of the Second World War.

Topham's family set the asking price at $275,000 when a British collector wanted to purchase it. He had no direct heirs and when his wife died the medal was inherited by two dozen of her relatives.

Topham was one of only 16 Canadians to earn the Commonwealth's highest award for courage during the war.

The Toronto native who died in 1974, was honoured for saving dozens of wounded soldiers when he ran into enemy fire in Germany on March 24, 1945.

He carried wounded men into the shelter of a wood despite being shot in the face. Topham refused medical attention until the other casualties had been taken care of.

Topham's medal will now be donated to the National War Museum in Ottawa.

Other similar fundraising campaigns have also been successful at keeping medals in Canada, including that of Lt.-Col. Jock McGregor of Powell River, B.C.

With files from Canadian Press and The Halifax Chronicle-Herald