Page 3197 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 21 September 1994
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I will explain why I do have reservations about this amendment, and I will speak to it in more detail later. I see it as transferring power from the patient to the doctor. One thing that I was most interested in and one thing that became more and more apparent, I think, to members of the committee was that there is an issue, not about just euthanasia but right across the spectrum, as to the extent to which the patient has the power to make decisions and the extent to which the medical practitioner should have the power to make decisions. In his speech Mr Connolly suggested that one way of handling this whole broad issue is to have it considered by the Standing Committee on Social Policy in the next Assembly. I think that is a very positive approach to the whole issue, because otherwise we are taking just a small part of the issue. That is something that I would support and it is one of the reasons why, at this stage, despite my reservations, I would be prepared to support that amendment circulated by the Minister for Health.
It was never intended that this Bill would be an active euthanasia Bill. In order to make that very clear, I made it public that I would continue to attempt to get an active euthanasia Bill before the Assembly at some time, but certainly not before the next election. I have made that very clear, and I do not resile from that; but that is not what is happening with this piece of legislation. Indeed, Mr Stevenson found from his survey that about 70 per cent of people support the concept of what I describe as passive euthanasia, and I realise that there is some semantic debate about that. That is fairly consistent with what, Australia-wide, Morgan gallup polls have found over the last few years. The Morgan gallup polls show a higher response; but the questions were slightly different and they fall in the middle of a series of questions, which could account, perhaps, for some of the difference. Nevertheless, an overwhelming number of people believe that they personally should have the right to say whether they are going to continue with medical treatment, even if it means the end of their life - or I probably should say "particularly if it means the end of their life".
Madam Speaker, I would like to take up a couple of points that Mr Stevenson raised from the letter from Rita Marker, the American woman who was brought out by Right to Life Australia when the debate was on about the Voluntary and Natural Death Bill. I also went to hear the speech that Mr Stevenson talked about, so that I could understand her perspective and where she was coming from. I would point out that the Remmelink report has been misquoted and misrepresented right across the world on innumerable occasions. That is one of the reasons why Professor Remmelink has been asked to come to Australia and to speak at a forum on euthanasia in a month or so. He will be in Sydney, and my understanding is that he will be invited to come to Canberra, where he can be asked those questions. If this was of such great concern, why was it that the Dutch Parliament overwhelmingly accepted the continuation of the system that operates in the Netherlands? That included, of course, the Social Democratic Party, which is strongly made up of people professing to be Christian - I think I am correct in saying this - and Catholic.
Some of the issues that are raised probably come from a fear of my own agenda. Certainly, in speaking to Margaret Tighe very briefly, I think, yesterday, that came through. It has certainly come through in a number of other discussions that I have had. I have made it very clear that my agenda is, eventually, active euthanasia. But this Bill
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