Mr. Speaker, we have heard many extremely poignant statements over the past few days in this chamber. Here are a few of them, not necessarily word for word, but the essence is there: This is by far the most crucial question we have faced in this chamber in the past 10 years. We are experiencing a fundamental shift in society. Centuries of thought are being overturned. Thousands of years of the understanding of the sacred gift of human life are being discarded.
The Liberal member of Parliament for Winnipeg Centre stated:
Perhaps this is just another step on the road of moral relativism that we are in nowadays, but even our judiciary cannot serve as a balance between the different societies making up Canada. We are in a sorry state. We have truly entered a new age, one of the throwaway culture where all boundaries are starting to crumble.
He goes on to say:
From an indigenous perspective, I look at this bill and I cannot support it, because it leads to a place where I do not believe we are looking out for the interests of all people within our society. It is not allowing us to fully comprehend the needs of everyone who makes up Canadian societies, but really, it is taking us down a path that is very dangerous, and we do not know where it ends.
This comment is true not only for our indigenous communities, but also for the overwhelming majority of all Canadians who are informed by their faith, whether that be Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, or Christian.
I want to read from a very insightful blog that I came across today.
...from its very first sentence the bill sounds the final death-knell, for all public purposes, of Abrahamic faith. The Carter/C-14 doctrine of autonomy is a clear repudiation of that kind of faith and the establishment of a new faith in man as utterly independent of God. One does not need to be Abrahamic to understand this. If the Parliament of Canada recognizes personal autonomy as extending a moral right to determine the manner and timing of one’s own death, and to take one’s own life or another’s life, it necessarily recognizes the person—and [Parliament] itself as a deliberative body of persons—as lying outside of all putative divine authority in such matters. In short, the C-14 preamble is the final repudiation of the Charter preamble. “The principles of fundamental justice”...now operate independently of any reference whatsoever to the supremacy of God. The link between “the supremacy of God and the rule of law” is decisively severed.
He then goes on to quote Nietzsche:
What were we doing when we unchained this earth from its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving? Away from all suns? Are we not plunging continually? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there still any up or down? Are we not straying, as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is not night continually closing in on us? Do we not need to light lanterns in the morning? Do we hear nothing as yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition? Gods, too, decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.
Over the past few days in the House, we have heard from many members with a wide variety of positions. Let me first say that I am very thankful that the government decided not to follow through with all of the recommendations made in the Liberal-dominated special joint committee report and decided rather to incorporate many of the comments of the dissenting report created by me and other members of the Conservative Party.
While Bill C-14 is a huge improvement from the very permissive, wide-open regime recommended by the joint committee, the legislation falls far short in protecting some of our most vulnerable Canadians, and as a result, I cannot support it.
First, there is no firm commitment to conscience protection for doctors and other health care workers who for a variety of reasons may not want to participate in any fashion in physician-assisted suicide. This includes the need to make a referral to a participating doctor.
While the preamble states boldly that it is “desirable to have a consistent approach to medical assistance in dying across Canada”, and later refers to “respect the personal convictions of health care providers”, there is no section in the actual clauses of Bill C-14, no clear, unequivocal statement that no doctor or health care worker would be under any obligation to participate.
Just as important, what about health care institutions and hospices which, because of the core values they embrace, may not want to have physician-assisted suicide available in their institutions? What about a hospice which raises upward of 50% of its own revenue from private donations and which relies largely on armies of volunteers and donors who believe in the inherent and intrinsic dignity of human life? My fear is that if any of these institutions are forced into situations in which they are obligated to engage in physician-assisted suicide, the community may face the very real possibility of losing those volunteers and donors, and ultimately, may in fact lose the very institution itself. This would be a tragic unintended consequence of not guaranteeing conscience rights to doctors, health care workers, and institutions.
These changes must be included in Bill C-14 if we are to respect the professionals and institutions that provide excellent quality of health care every day.
There also needs to be a clear commitment to providing palliative care as a real and viable option. To offer physician-assisted suicide without a meaningful offer of available and palliative care is to provide no option.
Let me quote Dr. David Baker:
Without a right to palliative care, Canadians will soon be receiving publicly funded physician assistance to die because it [palliative care] is not available. This will infringe their s. 7 Charter right to life, liberty and the security of their persons and their section 15 equality rights as Canadians with disabilities and seniors.
Another important amendment that is needed is to have a system of prior review. There needs to be a legal system in place to ensure that no coercion occurs and to ensure that the two independent witnesses are in fact independent and that the two independent doctors are in fact independent.
Dr. Trudo Lemmens, the chair on health law and policy at the faculty of law at the University of Toronto stated:
...some eligibility criteria are inevitably quite open to interpretation, which makes it all the more problematic that an assessment of competency and informed consent by two physicians is seen as sufficient to ensure compliance. I continue to support a prior review system as reflected in the Vulnerable Person Standard, which is supported by a wide and inclusive coalition of patient and disability advocacy groups, health professional organizations, health care institutions and individuals with a wide variety of ideological and religious affiliations.
While I am fundamentally opposed to the taking of human life at any point, if we are to adopt legislation as a House of Commons, if we are going to go down this road, we need to be sure that we have far more stringent safeguards included in the bill.
