Hearing begins in the last Australian state without euthanasia

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The voluntary assisted suicide (VAD) bill in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, passes a parliamentary investigation.

The NSW Legislative Council has begun the first of three hearings on Wednesday. NSW’s assisted suicide bill 2021, a legislation proposed in a long four-day debate, passed House 52-32 on November 26.

The bill limits VAD to end-stage patients who die within 12 months. Two doctors are required to evaluate an applicant, and attempts to induce a VAD application are considered a crime.

Independent MP Alex Greenwich, who submitted the bill on October 14, said it would give dying people “the choices, comfort, dignity, and respect they deserve.”

“Without the option of assisted suicide, those who receive bad news about the end-stage prognosis are afraid, and sadly the suicide rate of people with end-stage illness is high,” Greenwich said. Read the reading speech.

Epoch Times Photo
MP Alex Greenwich independent of members of Summerhill Jo Haylen and MP Penny Sharp at a press conference at the New South Wales State Parliament on September 26, 2019 in Sydney, Australia. (Brooke Mitchell / Getty Images)

Liberal and Labor deputy leaders Stuart Ayers and Prue Kerr agreed with the bill. However, both NSW Prime Minister Dominique Perotet and opposition leader Krismins objected.

“In many ways, I think it’s a bad prosecution of society that many people feel they have to end their lives like this,” Perotet said. “It’s very important when people reach the end of their lives. They are given the care and support they deserve.”

Opponents argue that VAD law is ultimately always subject to abuse.

Tasmanian Senator Eric Abetz said euthanasia is often watered down in reality, and Congress’s focus should be on improving palliative care rather than thinking about ways to end the patient’s life. Insisted that.

“Medical evidence from around the world has repeatedly shown that euthanasia-despite good intentions-is abused and ends the lives of vulnerable people,” Abets said earlier. I told the Epoch Times. “Euthanasia advocates consistently push forward with ideas for rigorous safeguards and review processes, but lower thresholds for those who want to loosen these safeguards and end their lives. Just implement it. “

Peter Culti, a part-time associate professor at the University of Notre Dame, responded to Abets.

“One of the dangers such law poses … is that the measurement of” intolerable pain “is ultimately completely subjective. Moreover, once physical pain is included, there is no reason to eventually eliminate mental pain, “he said in the commentary.

“Once you cross the last frontier of assisted suicide by a doctor, you can’t go back.”

Pro Life Demonstrator Australia Melbourne
Prolife demonstrators gather outside the Victorian Parliament to oppose the progressive government euthanasia law in Melbourne on June 18, 2019. (AAP image via James Ross / AP)

New South Wales will be Australia’s last state to legalize assisted suicide if the bill gains majority support in the Senate next year (with the same rights as the state that enacts such a law). Except for areas that do not have it).

Victoria became the first state to legalize assisted suicide in June 2019, and Western Australia filed a proceeding in June 2021. The VAD Act will be available in Tasmania and South Australia starting next year and in Queensland on January 1, 2023.

The NSW Legislative Council will report before the first seat date in 2022. The other two hearings will be held on December 10th and December 13th and will be livestreamed through Congress. Website..

Epoch Times Sydney Staff

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