Page 4394 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 19 November 1991
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I would like to mention two cases. One is of a soldier in World War I who was at both Battles of the Somme, was seriously wounded in the second Battle of the Somme, and was invalided back to Scotland where, for over a year, he was in hospital. For the rest of his life he suffered the effects of his wounds and the trauma of the war. His condition affected the way he thought about life and death, about society, about economic values, about everything in life, including personal relationships.
This person - and I assure you that I am trying to speak as accurately and carefully as I can, from direct knowledge - in his middle and later years, was in direct contact with the Euthanasia Society of Great Britain - I am not sure I have the title right, but that is the nature of the society - asking that his life be taken. Of course that was illegal and, I suppose, unthinkable in the United Kingdom of that time; we are talking about maybe 30 years ago.
At times of his life he was in very great pain, both mentally and psychologically. I think people used to call it neurasthenia. Perhaps there are other terms now. We are partly playing with words. There was not any doubt about the way sometimes this particular man saw life. However, I want to say of him that, whatever he may then have said and written - and I recall one of his letters - what happened to him in life was that in his mid-eighties he became a migrant to Australia for the second time and lived another seven years, dying at the age of 91 in Jindalee Nursing Home, dying - if I may take the useful description given by Mr Moore - a good death.
Dying a good death is itself a value to be considered. It is all very well for us standing here in good health to say that. We may not think that when we are 91. But I do believe that there is such a concept. It is not only a religious concept; I think it is a secular concept as well. Had his wishes been carried out when he was a middle-aged to late middle-aged man, he would not have had that satisfaction of a longer life, of seeing his grandchildren born and growing up, of living a new and rich life in his eighties and nineties. He was someone who at that time in his life believed in euthanasia.
The second case I want to mention - and I hope you will accept that these cases are meant to be illustrative; individual cases do not prove things - is rather different. It is not of someone who probably had any views one way or the other on euthanasia, as far as I know. It is the case of a woman who had been through two stillbirths, several miscarriages, a clinically approved abortion and a series of personal tragedies. (Extension of time granted)
She wished to die, and she set about the business of trying to commit suicide full tilt. At a time of great distress 28 years ago, not in this city, she attempted suicide. There is no doubt in my mind that she wished to do that.
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