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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-06-24 Daily Xml
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VOLUNTARY EUTHANASIA BILL

Introduction and First Reading

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (10:46): Obtained leave and introduced a bill for an act to provide for the administration of medical procedures to assist the death of a limited number of patients who are in the terminal phase of a terminal illness, who are suffering unbearable pain and who have expressed a desire for the procedures subject to appropriate safeguards; and for other purposes. Read a first time.

Second Reading

The Hon. R.B. SUCH (Fisher) (10:46): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

This is a sensitive issue. As we all know, there are many people in the community who support it—according to the public opinion poll, approximately 80 per cent—and there are many people obviously who, for religious and other reasons, do not support it. There are many people, for example, within the Catholic and Lutheran faith, particularly within the hierarchy, who have expressed concern about the possibility of voluntary euthanasia. However, within some of the other churches—notably, many of the members within the uniting Church, some within the Baptist Church and others who go under the heading of Christian also support voluntary euthanasia.

There have been many attempts over time to introduce a measure here, both in this chamber and the other, and, contrary to what some people may think, I love life and I want people to have fulfilling lives free of pain and suffering. I do not seek the premature death of anyone, but there are some cases—not many, but some—where, despite a generally good palliative care system in South Australia, they cannot get adequate pain relief. There are some diseases—not a lot—such as some of the cancers, motor neurone and some of those other very nasty and terrible diseases where the pain cannot be totally relieved.

My bill is not an open slather for people who want to end their life, even though they may be dying. My bill is strictly limited to people who are in the terminal phase—that is, the final phase—of a terminal illness (they are dying and they are in the final stage), who are suffering unbearable pain, and obviously it is not able to be treated, and who have expressed a desire for their life to come to an end.

It is not an easy procedure for someone to go through. Under my bill they have to be mentally competent; they are not allowed to be depressed, although we can understand that if anyone is in a terminal phase of a terminal illness they would naturally have some degree of anxiety. However, they are not to be people who have clinical depression. They have to be assessed by two independent doctors. The witnesses are not to benefit from the estate, so the argument that people may wish to accelerate the departure of a wealthy relative is not possible under my bill.

In fact my bill, because it is so limited, has been criticised by some advocates for voluntary euthanasia, who say that it does not allow for an advance request. Under my legislation, you cannot indicate in advance that you want your life ended. For example, if you got into a particular state and wanted to depart this earth, my bill does not allow or provide for that. As a result, some people who are keen supporters of voluntary euthanasia have been critical of my bill. My bill is a very limited mechanism with a monitoring committee containing representatives from the Council of Churches, the AMA, the Law Society, the Palliative Care Council, the Voluntary Euthanasia Society and Disability SA, and it has a lot of safeguards built into it.

I was on radio last week, on FIVEaa with Lainie Anderson, when a lady rang in to say: 'Well, this is similar to allowing abortion.' No, it is not. An unborn child has no say in their future. I am not here today to debate the merits of that issue, but this is not comparable with abortion, because an unborn cannot make a conscious decision to be or not to be born, obviously.

This caller rang in and I sympathised with her concerns about abortion. She was arguing that the law has been relaxed here so that anyone can basically get an abortion up to about 26 weeks. I do not believe that the law has changed in that regard, but this is not parallel with abortion because, as I say, you cannot be part of the voluntary euthanasia provision of my bill unless you are mentally competent, have been assessed by two independent doctors and witnessed by two people who have no financial benefit to gain.

There are other safeguards in the bill as well, so I say to people that no-one who has a religious or any other belief against voluntary euthanasia has to be involved, either as a patient or as a health professional. No-one is imposing this on anyone else; no-one is saying that you have to be involved in this as a professional or as a patient. It is voluntary euthanasia purely for those people for whom their conscience or religious belief allows it.

People have their different views of God. I do not accept the view that we have a god of pain and suffering. I remember our inquiry into voluntary euthanasia by the Social Development Committee. One of the senior members of the Catholic Church said that pain had a role because it helped—I guess he was using the analogy of Daniel from the Old Testament—not to build character but, I suppose, to test someone.

I do not share that view and, after that senior cleric expressed it, two of the nuns (sisters from Mary Potter Hospice) came up to me. One of them put a hand on my arm and said: 'He is not in the same world that we are. We are dealing with people who are dying every day.' They did not say that they supported voluntary euthanasia as proposed at that time—under, I think, the Sandra Kanck provision—but they said that it is not a black and white issue and it is not as simple as the view indicated by that person in the hierarchy of the church.

At the moment, people are not going to come forward from the medical profession and say they have helped to terminate someone's life, because they could be charged with murder. However, in reality, in our state and society, it is happening. You can accelerate the death of a person by, for example, some of the treatments through chemotherapy. The argument would be we are not trying to kill them but, effectively, you do. By increasing the pain treatment regime you can accelerate the death. The argument would be we are not trying to do that.

Even within the Catholic faith, and some others, they say, 'We don't have a problem if you withdraw life support,' so it really indicates that there is a grey area. We had a recent court judgment here where the court ruled that someone in a nursing home will be allowed to starve themselves to death. I am not critical of the judge because I think the judgment was what that person wanted, but I think it is appalling that in South Australia we are saying to someone that we are going to let you die and you can starve yourself to death. If you did that to your pet dog you would be prosecuted, and rightly so.

You would be prosecuted if you said, 'I am going to starve my dog to death because it has a bad illness,' or something. One of the cruellest courses that we could put before someone is to make them starve to death in order to achieve what they want. It is their life: they have the ability to make a decision, and they should be able to make the decision on the basis of the quality of life. I am more concerned about the quality of life than the quantity of life. So I think it is important that people have the right to choose.

My bill is not about a slippery slope. It is very tight. When the Hon. Andrew Evans was in here I asked him, and some of the others, 'If you can tell me how this bill can be tightened up if you do not think the safeguards are tight enough, even though some of the people in the voluntary euthanasia movement believe it is too tight, you tell me.' He could not, and no-one else has come to me and said, 'Your bill can be tightened by another provision.'

I put this bill before the house. I am sure all members will consider it thoughtfully. I make the point that we are in here to represent our community, and MPs have plenty of time, because there is no election pending, to ask their constituents, 'Do you support this bill: yes or no?' and make sure they have the detail. I challenge anyone to come in here and say that a majority in their electorate does not support it. There may be one or two. The member for Schubert said that his electorate has a very strong Lutheran community and they may indicate to him some concern but, if a proper survey is done, as has been done for the Murdoch press, the results will show that 80 per cent of the public supports voluntary euthanasia.

When it comes to the point of someone wanting to access this—and I hope it never happens to anyone in here or any of their loved ones—it is too late. People can be screaming in agony. We had a former office bearer of the parliament (I will not name the person) who had one of those shocking diseases, motor neurone disease, and when people visited him he asked them to kill them because he was in so much agony and pain. That is terrible. It is disgraceful and disgusting to allow that to happen to a human being. So I say to people: even if you personally do not support it, you should act so that those who want it and are requesting it have the option. I emphasise that it is voluntary and not compulsory for anyone to be involved—a health professional or a patient.

I am pro life in the sense that I want people to have lengthy, happy, peaceful and enjoyable lives. I do not want people to be suffering. If you talk to people who work with those who are dying, many of them can get pain relief, we know that, through palliative care, but some cannot. It might only be 12 people in South Australia per year, but those people are important and they have the right to end their life in dignity. If you are wealthy enough, you can fly to Switzerland. That is something that should not need to happen. You should not have to go to another country to end your life. There are costs involved, especially if the remains do not come back as ashes. I know from a recent case, three weeks ago, concerning someone who died in France, that the cost of repatriating that body to South Australia was $17,000. The cost of those sorts of options, apart from the actual action in Switzerland, is out of the range of most people.

In South Australia we have led in many progressive ways. Let's allow people to have this right with tight safeguards, a limited option, to a limited number of people, who are dying, who are in the final phase. If members can tell me how this bill can be improved, the parliament and I are happy to consider any amendment they want to put forward.

With those remarks, I commend the bill to the house, and I trust that members will see themselves as representing their electorate rather than considering their own religious or personal views, which may be in contrast to what is in the bill. I am not in here to represent myself, and nor is anybody else in here to represent themselves, their religious views, or their own other personal views.

I commend the bill to the house and ask members to, as I am sure they will, thoughtfully consider what it is proposing and to look at what it is not proposing, because that is just as important. It is a limited option in limited circumstances for a very small number of people. It is not a slippery slope, because no changes could be made without coming back to the full parliament. It is not something that someone can tinker with once the parliament has made a ruling; it is not going to be suddenly changed easily. I commend this bill to the house. It represents, I think, a fair and reasonable approach.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. S.W. Key.

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