I appreciate the attempt to deal with the issue of suffering and the need for appropriate palliative care to be offered. I'm just having difficulty dealing with the language and how it connects. We're talking under line 17, page 5, so it would read: “that they have a voluntary request”, this is eligibility for medical assistance in dying under (d), “that in particular was not made as a result of external pressure or lack of access to services required to address the underlying cause of the request such as palliative care, chronic pain”.
It's saying you do not have access to this, and I think the language is confusing. The special committee and committee members have heard numerous times of the importance of palliative care. We heard from CMA that 70% of people who need palliative care don't have it. We've heard from the government there's a plan to deal with the provinces, and short of an amendment to the Canada Health Act requiring palliative care
I appreciate the attempt, but I don't know if this is going to change what is hoped for, and maybe another part of the bill would be a better part to deal with this. The language is confusing, and I don't think it will get the hoped for results. I'll abstain on this one.