Page 2886 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 September 1994
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Why was it not stopped there? It could not be stopped there because the ALP platform says that the ALP supports active euthanasia. So how does the ALP get on its bike and pedal backwards at a rate of 100 miles an hour to make sure that it does not lose face with its own limited constituency, which meets in a phone box on a Thursday night? They say, "Let us try to find a compromise". So what does the committee do? It then sets about watering down the initial legislation that Mr Moore put forward, as was his right, and we find the Medical Treatment Bill that we have before us, which was going to be the one to make everyone pull out and agree. That is fine. There were rumours around the place that the bishops agree with this. So what did some of us do? We actually rang the bishops, and we found that the bishops did not agree with it. Some of the bishops said, "Our opinion is that the perfect thing is to do nothing, because we are quite satisfied with what is going on at the minute". We have not had any doctors kicking doors down and saying, "Please, Assembly, would you legislate on this issue, because it is something that is occupying our minds 100 per cent". Not one person has done that. As Mr Kaine quite rightly said, those people in our community that support active euthanasia did speak to us, and we listened to them and we expressed our point of view as well.
But it is not as if this is a burning issue in the community. For heaven's sake! Thirty per cent of our young people out there are unemployed, and we are sitting here today, or standing here today - although there is not much difference when I am doing it - debating an issue which is a nonsense issue. We do not need to be debating this issue today. No-one wanted us to do this. What we are doing purely and utterly is playing a political game in order to satisfy Mr Moore. Once again, I commend Mr Moore because he has been quite up-front about this. More importantly, we are playing a political game to enable the Australian Labor Party to back-pedal. That is what this debate is all about.
This legislation is bad law. Let us look at the process. We have had a committee initially to look at a piece of legislation, which had nothing to do with this, by the way, and they rejected that.
Mr Moore: That is not correct.
MR DE DOMENICO: Well, it had something to do with it. I am sorry, Mr Moore. Let me be as accurate as I can. Initially, we were looking at active euthanasia as well as passive euthanasia. So we have separated one from the other. The committee said, "There is not community support for active euthanasia. Just look at the passive side". We have done that. Then we have come in here to debate the issue, and we have amendments by Mr Connolly for a start. On this "superb" piece of legislation we have a number of pages of amendments from Mr Connolly. We have amendments from Mr Moore. We have amendments from Mr Humphries. Are we not looking at opening a Pandora's box here? Are we not really trying to solve in a legalistic way what is sometimes thought to be a moral problem? Is that not the wrong way to do things? I believe that it is, especially when there is no great ground swell out there in the community to say, "Please, ACT Legislative Assembly, legislate" - in a way in which no other jurisdiction has done, by the way. I am aware of legislation in South Australia, Victoria and the Northern Territory. There is no burning pressure on this Assembly to legislate in the way we are today.
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