Thank you, Madam Chair.
It is perhaps appropriate to recall the context of this bill. Many things are being said, and at a certain point, they completely confuse the basic issue.
Suicide in Canada is decriminalized. Assisted suicide is still a criminal offence, barring certain exceptions. We did not decide that this evening. Rather, the courts told us that the legislation violated the right to life. There was Bill C-14 and, before that, the Carter decision, which led to Bill C-14. Mr. Lewis says that we are encouraging suicidal people to commit suicide. However, it is quite the opposite.
I cannot fathom how the justices in the Carter decision, who told lawmakers to go back and do their homework, would react. How would Justice Baudouin react to the comments I have just heard, which are an all-out assault on the courts' interpretation that led them to tell lawmakers that the current legislation violates the right to life of people with irremediable conditions and intolerable pain and suffering? The courts are of the opinion that people are currently being compelled to act before they would want to do so, meaning when they have passed the point of what is tolerable for them. According to the current legislation, they are being compelled to commit suicide; that's what the Superior Court said. They are being compelled to end their lives prematurely.
I really want us to try to justify a rather straightforward amendment that we could have voted on pretty quickly, but here we are. We need to respond to the court's ruling with Bill C-7. We must return to the fundamental issue. The court told us not to violate the right to life of people with irremediable conditions experiencing intolerable suffering. They want to live until they have passed the point of what is tolerable for them.
That does not happen after an accident. Someone who has an accident tomorrow morning and becomes quadriplegic might become suicidal and would receive care for that state. Over the course of their care—because we do provide care for people—they could one day decide to request MAID, and that request will then be assessed according to the safeguards set out here.
Out of respect for the work we must do, let's not confuse the basic issue. I know that we are presenting all the arguments we can, but the purpose is not at all to encourage any suicidal state. Let me repeat that suicidal states are reversible. We are talking about access to medical assistance in dying and a person's ability to make that decision, which is not made lightly. People at that stage will have exhausted all other options over the course of their care. Paragraph 241.2(3.1)(g) ensures that people will recognize the full range of care available to them and all options they have.
I'm ready to vote.