Page 3222 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 21 September 1994
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the authority or the right to consider this matter, and then, when an individual member introduces a Bill, to say that we do not have the right to consider alterations makes a mockery of the process. We are not making a mockery of it; nor are the people who will support this Bill, nor are the people who have introduced it and nor is the Assembly's committee that inquired into this matter. I suggest that you need to look in the mirror if you are making those allegations.
MRS CARNELL (Leader of the Opposition) (12.27): Madam Speaker, I would like to reinforce the comments made by Mr Lamont. The committee did ask all of those questions. The most important questions that the committee asked of every single person who appeared, apart from the active euthanasia questions, were: Do you believe that people have a right to make a living will? Do people have a right to a comfortable death? Do people have a right to adequate pain relief? Fascinatingly, every single group who appeared, including the people who appeared for the Right to Life group, said yes. They were asked:
... our mutual position on this was that people did have a right to die with as much dignity as possible; that people did have a right to knock back treatment; that there was a right to allow natural death to occur when the patient determined that that was what they wanted. We also established that there was a right for people to die - wherever possible, and hopefully always - without pain. Is that a fair position?
The gentleman who appeared for the Right to Life Association said yes. A little later, Bishop Power appeared. He was asked:
Regardless of the drafting - we will just talk philosophically, morally - you are saying that you do not have a problem with people having a right to a natural death and saying at some stage, "Look, enough is enough. Thank you very much. No more antibiotics ...".
Bishop Power said:
There is no doubt about that at all.
Further on he was asked:
So the Victorian and South Australian style of legislation, whether we like the way it was drafted or not - the intent of a natural death, a Bill to ensure that both the patient and the medical fraternity are adequately protected, and the patient's rights to the things that we have spoken about are protected - is acceptable, as long as the drafting is right. Is that a fair statement?
Bishop Power said:
Yes, we will accept that.
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