Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Thank you. Dr. Gaind, you spoke very clearly about the issue of mental health. I was trying to understand the role that you thought psychiatrists should play for patients with a terminal illness or physical health issues who might request physician-assisted dying. Do you see a

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Particularly in this enormous country that we live in, with a lot of rural areas and no physician access at all.... However, you're quite right that the Supreme Court ruling refers to “physician-assisted dying”, although the Quebec ruling through Bill 52 talks about “medical aid

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Another issue that has come up in our discussions with previous witnesses has to do with advance directives. The Supreme Court didn't contemplate advance directives, and the debate in Quebec on Bill 52 was very conflicted on advance directives, which were actually dropped from th

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Thank you, Chair. I'd like to pursue Mr. Rankin's issue about uniform access. You yourselves talked about a pan-Canadian approach. I'd like to know how all of you might respond to a recommendation that we heard yesterday from the provincial-territorial expert advisory group. T

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  If I might, I'd like to ask about recommendations 12 and 13, on the timing of the completion of the declaration of competence, and specifically about advance directives. You say on page 32 that you “recognize that rules about advance directives vary across the country and, there

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Could you give us some idea of the argumentation you went through? You said that the panel itself had difficulty with this issue, and certainly Quebec had difficulty with this issue, because they ultimately took it out of Bill 52. Could you give us some of the input you had when

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  If I may, I would ask Monsieur Ménard about the advance directives issue. The National Assembly's Select Committee on Dying with Dignity report recommended, in recommendation 19, that advance directives be taken into consideration. It even requested that “necessary measures to

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Would you see this also providing some kind of built-in mechanism to evaluate, in an ongoing way, how the system is working and to perhaps make changes?

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  If I have time, I might move to another question that is somewhat related. When the justice officials were here last week, they said that Canada is in a rather unique jurisdictional situation because issues in our Criminal Code are federal and health is provincial-territorial.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Thank you very much. The external panel, in its report, suggested that Canada has an opportunity to be a world leader in developing an oversight system for physician-assisted dying. Data collection, effective monitoring, and reporting with scientific rigour is one form of safeg

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  The Supreme Court decision speaks to charter rights not only of patients but also of physicians. Therefore, patients have the right to access but physicians have the right to conscientious objection. I'm wondering if you have any advice to offer us on how to reconcile what are po

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Okay. You're suggesting that it's the provinces that would deal with this particular aspect of the Canadian charter rights.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Thank you very much. I'd like to change the subject to something you mentioned right at the very beginning of your presentation on terminology. You said that there are differences in terminology used in discussions by different groups and there are subtleties implied in their us

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Thank you, Chair. Thank you very much. This is a complicated issue, of course. In reviewing Quebec's Bill 52, An Act respecting end-of-life care, have you encountered problems specifically with regard to those jurisdictional issues that you have put forward as huge challenges—

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  In your best expert opinion, there aren't particular aspects of assisted dying that Parliament itself, at a federal level, should address in legislation and those that must be left to the provinces.