Vulnerable Tasmanians at risk if Greens’ euthanasia bill passed

Australian Christian Lobby

May, 2009

The Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) today called on Tasmanian parliamentarians to reject the euthanasia bill introduced by Greens’ leader Nick McKim today, saying that the trumpeted safeguards have been shown not to work and, if passed, the legislation would put the lives of vulnerable sick and elderly Tasmanians at risk.

ACL Tasmanian Director Nick Overton said that if Mr McKim’s private member’s bill succeeds the ‘right to die’ could quickly become the ‘duty to die’ under the new culture legalised euthanasia inevitably creates.

“Supposed safeguards for euthanasia legislation don’t work,” Mr Overton said. “The Northern Territory euthanasia legislation enacted in 1996 contained basically the same safeguards as those being promoted by Tasmanian Greens’ leader Nick McKim. However there are significant doubts about whether two of the four people who died under these laws (repealed nine months later) were actually terminally ill. Of the seven people whose deaths were associated with the laws, four were said to have symptoms of depression.

“In Holland where euthanasia has been practiced since the 1990s, 1000 people per year are killed without their consent. The Dutch experience shows that so-called voluntary euthanasia quickly becomes non-voluntary euthanasia.”

Mr Overton said that Tasmania has already previously considered euthanasia laws in 1998, with a parliamentary inquiry unanimously deciding to reject legalising euthanasia because it “would pose a serious threat to the more vulnerable members of society”. The inquiry also found that “in the majority of cases palliative care was able to provide optimum care for suffering patients”.

“If euthanasia was legalised in line with the Greens’ leader’s aims it would profoundly affect the value of life in our society and corrupt the practice of medicine, affecting the role of doctors who are meant to care for the sick not to kill them,” Mr Overton said. “As a society, we should be seeking to ease people’s pain through better palliative care, not promoting killing as an alternative to helping them.

“We should also be considering the message euthanasia laws send to the disabled and elderly. No society has the right to create an expectation that you should terminate your life if you would otherwise be an inconvenience to society. This would be a dreadful situation.”

Mr Overton said that the Tasmanian Parliament should be affirming the unique and intrinsic worth of all human beings, no matter what their physical, mental or emotional state might be. He called on all parliamentarians to vote against the bill.

Media Contact: Glynis Quinlan on 0408 875 979