Bill C-14 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code and to make related amendments to other Acts (medical assistance in dying)

This enactment amends the Criminal Code to, among other things,
(a) create exemptions from the offences of culpable homicide, of aiding suicide and of administering a noxious thing, in order to permit medical practitioners and nurse practitioners to provide medical assistance in dying and to permit pharmacists and other persons to assist in the process;
(b) specify the eligibility criteria and the safeguards that must be respected before medical assistance in dying may be provided to a person;
(c) require that medical practitioners and nurse practitioners who receive requests for, and pharmacists who dispense substances in connection with the provision of, medical assist­ance in dying provide information for the purpose of permitting the monitoring of medical assistance in dying, and authorize the Minister of Health to make regulations respecting that information; and
(d) create new offences for failing to comply with the safeguards, for forging or destroying documents related to medical assistance in dying, for failing to provide the required information and for contravening the regulations.
This enactment also makes related amendments to other Acts to ensure that recourse to medical assistance in dying does not result in the loss of a pension under the Pension Act or benefits under the Canadian Forces Members and Veterans Re-establishment and Compensation Act. It amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to ensure that no investigation need be conducted under section 19 of that Act in the case of an inmate who receives medical assistance in dying.
This enactment provides for one or more independent reviews relating to requests by mature minors for medical assistance in dying, to advance requests and to requests where mental illness is the sole underlying medical condition.
Lastly, this enactment provides for a parliamentary review of its provisions and of the state of palliative care in Canada to commence at the start of the fifth year following the day on which it receives royal assent.

Criminal Code

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, since 1988, when I was first elected, I have been part of a House leadership team of sorts, whether it was in the province of Manitoba or here. I would suggest to the member that opposition and government members need to recognize the value of certainty. There are certain things that government is able to do, but there are also obligations of opposition. We need certainty. Both sides need certainty. If the political will on all sides is to make sure that members get heard and the certainty of respecting the Supreme Court deadline is there, it is amazing what the House leaderships of all three parties can do if they are prepared to work together. However, it takes the three parties, and we have to work with our independents, in order to make that happen. If the respect is there, who knows? Keep in mind that we still have third reading to deal with.

I would suggest to all members, if they are genuinely concerned, that they take the time to talk to and explain the importance of goodwill and trust with the House leadership.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I obviously listened carefully to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons.

In a number of speeches, including his, members often mention June 6 as some kind of unavoidable deadline. I admit that I am a bit less of a stickler than my colleague on this, although this date is an important objective.

Why is the government not focusing as much on the fact that the Supreme Court rendered a unanimous decision in Carter? A unanimous decision does not come around often in Canadian law. That seems just as important to me.

We must acknowledge that the Supreme Court is representative of the Canadian public, in a way. Perhaps we could move forward more quickly if the government were open to some amendments to bring the bill closer to the unanimous decision rendered by the Supreme Court.

It is very clear where we are going with this bill, and I think we could come to an agreement quickly if we put as much emphasis on the unanimous decision as on the June 6 date.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I respect the question. Whether it was in the comments or the response to the first question, I indicated how important it is that we do respect the Supreme Court of Canada's decision and deadline. I talked about it during second reading. I believe that we have experts around the table, constitutional experts, individuals who are maybe a bit above my pay grade but who bring a lot to the table, to make sure the constitutionality of this legislation is intact, with the potential for a charter challenge and so forth.

I am confident that the bill will do the job.

Again, I will emphasize that we still have third reading on this particular piece of legislation to have more dialogue.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Mr. Speaker, today I am truly honoured to have the opportunity to speak on this bill.

Initially I wanted to listen to all of my colleagues within the House, because I recognize that it is important to listen to all Canadians. I recognize that the 338 parliamentarians bringing their views and the views from their constituents is just as important as listening to all the things I have as well. Giving their views, as we have seen today, is so important. I thank all of the members taking part in today's debate.

My role as a parliamentarian is to do the fact-finding, speaking to the constituents I represent, and making sure that I get the right message to make this decision and do what is right for my constituency and all Canadians. From that, I decided to do a lot of town halls. I sent letters to each and every physician in my riding. I had one-on-one meetings with many stakeholders, whether they were physicians dealing with palliative care or people who had family members with chronic illnesses. I also received many emails and letters as well as postcard campaigns.

To start, I want to share one of the letters that I received from one of the physicians. It is one of many that I received, but today I want to share this letter from Dr. Carroll Harder:

I am e-mailing in response to your letter I received requesting information on my concerns about Bill C-14. Thank you for requesting physician input. I certainly appreciate having the opportunity to weigh-in as a stakeholder in these decisions. This topic is obviously very important to me and I am trying to understand all of the implications of this for me and for my patients.

I appreciate the steps that have been put in place to provide checks and balances that will hopefully prevent abuse of this system by family or health care providers. I am concerned that many groups are calling for less restrictions than those that are currently in place dictating who applies for this and who is ineligible. I would ask that you, as our representative, continue to advocate for stringent restrictions with multiple layers of accountability to prevent abuse of this legislation.

I understand the protection that is in place for health care providers who conscientiously object to participating in Physician Assisted Dying, and again would appreciate your advocacy with medical bodies to ensure that this remains in place, even for those physicians practising in remote areas that may be pressured to provide the service when no one else who does is available in a reasonable geographic distance.

It is letters like this that I put together with all these types of information when coming to a conclusion on how I will proceed in voting as the representative for Elgin—Middlesex—London.

Overall, I had many concerns when I saw this legislation. When I looked at the joint report, there were some great concerns for me on things, including eligibility to include mature minors and those with mental illness. There is the need for palliative care. One of the biggest concerns I have is on the rights of physicians. Being a mom, the issue of mature minors is something that is also very important to me.

When the bill came back, I felt it was very necessary to vote in favour to send it to committee. I had to trust my colleagues sitting on that committee, from all parties. I would like to extend great gratitude to the member for Mount Royal. I had the opportunity to sit in on some of those debates and discussions. I had the opportunity to really hear what people were saying.

The work that gets done in committee is amazing. This week, many Canadians have seen the work that does not get done here in Parliament, but it is at the committee level where we see good work being done. I would like to applaud the member for Mount Royal, as well as all of my colleagues who took part in these really important discussions.

There is something about going and listening to the people. I listened to people who were representing Dying With Dignity, which had a very far side compared to some of the people who are proactive in making sure that we do not have euthanasia. It is very different to listen to Dying With Dignity witnesses compared to listening to the Association for Community Living, for instance.

I went home and had discussions with people in my community. One of the constituents I met with was Dr. John Hofhuis. He is not only a close personal friend, but he is a well-known and respected physician in Elgin—Middlesex—London, who just recently retired. He lost his wife from liver disease. She had suffered for almost three years. I wanted to pick his brain to see what his thoughts were, not only as a physician but as a family member.

He shared with me all of the trying moments that he went through, and all the moments he went through having to see his children and his children's children suffer because of what their mother and grandmother was going through.

Another physician I reached out to was Dr. Derek Vaughan. He was a family physician, a general practitioner, in St. Thomas for a number of years, but in the last few months he has restricted his practice to palliative care only. He went from being a general doctor to doing house visits with about 10 members of the community. He visits long-term care homes as well. I spoke to him because not only is he a physician but he is suffering from MS. I really wanted to dig into his brain as well.

I also had discussions with my parents-in-law. My father-in-law should be a priest today but after three years of studying he decided to step back from that. I am fortunate and lucky because he was able to provide me with not only his religious insight but his insight as a person who used to counsel people. That was great.

One of the most important people that I can remember from all the discussions is a lady named Alice. Alice came to my town hall. She suffers from two irremediable diseases. She told me that she needs this legislation. To me, it is about listening to people like Alice. I listened to people on all sides of the issue, but when I sat down and spoke to a lady who in the next few years will lose her life, and I recognized the pain and suffering that she will go through, it is individuals like her and those discussions that really affect me.

Another part that I want to speak about, and something that is going to come up I am sure in future legislation, is the care of minors. Everybody in the House and everybody across the country has probably heard that I am the mother of five children. My children always tell me that things are different now than when I was growing up. I grew up on John Hughes films and Michael Jackson. Things were totally different back in the eighties. Those were great years.

We are now in 2016 and children are on their cellphones, iPads, or whatever all the time. They are wired 100% of the time. Whatever happens on a Friday night stays with them Friday night, Saturday morning, Saturday night, Sunday morning. It is a different time. I am finding that children are now living in a much more chaotic world. As I said, they are wired in and there are all these things happening online. I could go home on a Friday night and on Monday morning face sunny skies but our children are not in that same situation. This affects the mental health of our children. Even my own children have suffered from this. We want to unplug them and help them, but unfortunately, society now is part of the issue. They become depressed and some are not able to get out of bed. We are creating grievous conditions for them as well. When it comes to mature minors, I do not want to see that happen.

Let me speak about the palliative care issue. Last month my Aunt Catherine passed away. She had been suffering from cancer and had the most tremendous end-of-life care that anyone could ask for. The last family photo we have of her is of her lying in her bed with all of her children, grandchildren, and her husband, Uncle Paul, around the bed as they ate Easter dinner together. That is one of the last family moments they had together. It was that extreme palliative care that gave her the best end-of-life situation one could ever ask for. That is why I advocate 100% for palliative care. We need to make sure that we do have a third option. There can be life; there can be assisted dying, and there must be palliative care for people who need that.

I have heard many times that this will be the law of the land. It is important as parliamentarians that we do it right. We should not do it quickly. I recognize there is a deadline of June 6. I have sat here and listened today to my NDP colleague. We are learning things from all parliamentarians as they get up and speak today, or would have spoken on Monday. It is very unfortunate those rights have been taken away from us once again, because this is how we learn. This is how parliamentarians can educate one another by sharing their stories, whether it is about my Aunt Catherine, or other things. When I am sharing my thoughts, members get a different sense of what is going on.

I am happy to be speaking today. I am concerned with what we have for amendments. I hope we can do more. I will be supporting the bill at this time, but if there are future amendments to include mature minors or those with mental illness without having the palliative care option there as well, I will not support this legislation in the future.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague across the floor obviously speaks with great sincerity and has definitely consulted with people in her constituency.

However, she did mention that June 6 was the deadline and we feel very strongly about trying to respect that deadline. I can remember well over a year ago when the Supreme Court of Canada made its judgment, wanting the government at the time to proceed in an expeditious fashion to begin the debate on this issue. Could she explain to me why her Conservative Party when it was in government did not begin the debate and why we have this very rushed schedule today?

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Mr. Speaker, back in 2015, when this came out, a panel was set up by the former justice minister. However, I look at the work we have done today, and we can talk about these timelines. Let us be honest, this week we did Bill C-2, Bill C-6, Bill C-10, and Bill C-11. We had all of these things shifted off of the Order Paper.

What has happened here is this. Although it is a very important bill, unfortunately, when it came to the agenda of what we were supposed to be discussing and what we were discussing, a lot of political games were being played at that time. This took away the rights of the opposition members to debate this. We can talk about that. However, let us be honest about what happened this week. We lost hours of crucial debate because of the actions of the government.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Elgin—Middlesex—London. I know her predecessor. I am not sure what they put in the water in that riding, but I do notice that both she and her predecessor demonstrated respect for the institution and its members. I thank her for her tone and the arguments she presented.

The only real collaboration between the government and the opposition on this extremely important issue happened while the report to the government was being written. I was present at one of the meetings. It was an exceptional instance of collaboration among senators and MPs of all stripes. Unfortunately, the bill before us is very different from the recommendations in that report. That should be cause for concern.

The government is so focused on meeting the supposedly incontrovertible June 6 deadline, failing which, it says, there will be a disastrous legal void. I do not buy that, because the Supreme Court set up a legal framework within which we can operate, at least temporarily.

Can my colleague speak to the steps available to the government to truly work collaboratively on Bill C-16 and, as in Quebec, achieve the greatest consensus possible on the issue, knowing that unanimity is not possible in any case?

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would first like to thank the member for his kind words. We just do it right in Elgin—Middlesex—London.

It is about serving the people. I have always said that this is what we are supposed to do here. When we talk about the June 6 deadline, it is important that we consult with all Canadians. Yes, the report that came from the joint committee is very different than what we see in the legislation. That is why we are here. We are supposed to be debating. You and I have different opinions on that. However, at the same time, if we would have had the respect of the government, we would have been able to get more done.

I applaud the committee for the hard work it did after the legislation was created. I know the members sat down and went through it. However, when it comes to amendments, we only have two hours of debate on amendments. That is just not enough. We need more. If we are supposed to be representing Canadians, we need 338 people representing Canadians not 188.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Anthony Rota]

Just for the record, I am sure the hon. member did not mean that her and I had differences in debate. I sure she meant the other person. I just thought I would clarify that.

The hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona on a point of order.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I know we have tried this before, but the third time is the charm. Given the importance of debate on this issue, it is important that we have another opportunity to extend it without affecting the timeline for the Supreme Court decision. Therefore, without moving the votes, we could extend debate on this.

Perhaps the government deputy House leader does not feel the same sense of urgency on this matter. He has been spearheading the movement against this motion today. He has spoken twice already, once at second reading and then at report stage, on this bill. However, other members have not spoken at all. They would appreciate that opportunity. I hope perhaps the deputy House leader has had time to call his boss and see if we can get a different answer this time.

The motion is: That notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, the time allocation order for Bill C-14, adopted on May 18, 2016, pursuant to Standing Order 78(3), be deemed amended to replace the words “not more than one further sitting day shall be allotted to the consideration of the report stage...of the bill” with the words “not more than two further sitting days shall be allotted to the consideration at report stage of the bill.”

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Anthony Rota]

Is there unanimous consent to propose the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Anthony Rota]

I believe it is fairly clear that we do not have unanimous consent.

It being 1:15 p.m., pursuant to order made Wednesday, May 18, 2016, it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the report stage of the bill now before the House.

The question is on Motion No. 1. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Anthony Rota]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.