Madam Speaker, let me begin by saying how sad I was to hear my colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie talk about that sorrowful anniversary. Everyone who has participated in this debate has shared some extraordinarily difficult stories, and I will be no exception.
We are talking about such a difficult issue, end of life. Medical assistance in dying is part of the end of life. I am just as frustrated as my colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie about the Liberals' failure to take action, even though we have been discussing this extremely personal and often extraordinarily difficult issue for 10 years now. The government is refusing to take action and show leadership on this issue. That is very sad.
This is not a partisan issue. It is about human life and respect for people who are in the final stages of their lives. In many cases, these people are in incredible pain. As parliamentarians, we have a responsibility to be there for them and make the necessary decisions. We need to show leadership on this. In my opinion, the fact that this issue has been dragging on for 10 years reflects parliamentarians' inability to respond appropriately.
That is why we are having this debate today. I welcome this debate. It is important, and we need a concrete outcome. The decisions made by the Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying are recommendations that must be implemented as soon as possible.
We all have profoundly painful memories when we talk about medical assistance in dying. My colleague, the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, shared with us his extremely difficult anniversary. Tomorrow, we will be entering November. That is a very difficult time for me.
Three years ago, my father, Terry Julian, passed away. He passed away in an extraordinarily painful time. He was in the palliative ward of Burnaby Hospital for two weeks before he died. He was in immense pain. The family rallied around. We tried to be there 24 hours a day during that period. It was extraordinarily difficult and heart-wrenching. When he finally passed, my sister was with him. I am incredibly grateful for that. My spouse and I were racing to the hospital, as were other members of the family. We were with him around the clock in his pain and in his final moments, but I was unable to arrive in time. If I could turn back the clock so that he did not experience those unbelievably difficult weeks before he passed, I would. It was heart-wrenching, as it is to all of us, to see him live through that difficult time.
A year later, my mother went through the exact same thing. It took two weeks for her to pass. She was in the palliative ward at Burnaby general hospital. It was an extraordinarily difficult time; again, we tried to be there 24 hours a day. The fact that my father had passed meant that my mother was simply not the same. They had been married for over 70 years, so the pain of a broken heart was obviously too much for her. I was with her when she passed. I held her hand, and I said prayers in her final moments. I was grateful for that privilege, that blessing to be with her. It was, again, extraordinarily difficult. If we could have changed the situation in some way so that she did not have to live through those two weeks of intense pain before passing, we would have given everything to do so.
These are heartbreaking moments. That is why the issue of medical assistance in dying is so important for us to consider. In each of our families, with our loved ones, many of us have experienced the pain of losing a loved one and the pain of seeing them suffer. Medical assistance in dying is designed not only to give those people a choice but also, as much as possible, to take away from the intense suffering that the person who is dying, the loved one, lives through. The entire family suffers from it as well when they are in the hospital ward at three or four in the morning, wondering what they can do to end the pain and suffering the loved one is going through. We do not want to see them suffer anymore; in a sense, their passing is a relief in one way. Yes, it is incredibly painful to know that they have passed on, but it is an end to their suffering.
In a civilized society, we try to make sure that people do not suffer unnecessarily. That is why this issue is such an important one. I think we all come from the same place. We have all, in the House and right across this country, lived the same difficult, terrible, extraordinarily painful experiences. As parliamentarians, we need to make sure that this suffering is relieved as much as possible.
I want to address a particular issue in the report, recommendation 10, which states that we need to support persons with disabilities. This is a fundamental part of the debate we are having today. When we look at those across the country who are forced to go to food banks to make ends meet or are homeless, more than half of them are people with disabilities. This country has failed people with disabilities; of that there is no doubt. We have seen some minor improvements in how people with disabilities are treated, but the reality is that this recommendation particularly strikes me as something we need to implement as quickly as possible. It will help ensure that people with disabilities are not faced with that terrible choice between MAID and a life in which they simply are not provided with the supports that are so essential. We have seen the number of times in which people with disabilities have chosen MAID because they have not gotten these supports.
We have pushed for a disability benefit that provides for a guaranteed livable basic income. The member for Winnipeg Centre brought forward a bill that would provide those supports for people with disabilities so that they are not forced into that unbelievably difficult choice. However, to date, we still do not have in place a guaranteed livable basic income that applies to people with disabilities, which would provide them with the dignity and respect they deserve and should expect from their country.
This is a fundamental issue that absolutely has to be resolved. This is a country that has provided enormous resources to the banks and big businesses, with a trillion dollars in liquidity supports to the banking sector over the last 15 years. We have given wealthy Canadians untold amounts, tens of billions of dollars a year, in the form of overseas tax havens. We have the resources to put into place a guaranteed livable basic income for people with disabilities now. I hope that, as part of this debate, we choose to do that. Every Canadian deserves dignity. This is a debate about dignity.