Federal gov’t fails to pass assisted dying legislation by today’s deadline
Posted June 6, 2016 6:24 am.
Last Updated June 6, 2016 10:26 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
OTTAWA – As of today, there is no law in place governing medically assisted dying in Canada.
A deadline the Supreme Court gave the federal government to draft a new law expired at midnight.
The High Court struck down the ban on medically assisted dying last year and gave Parliament a year to come up with a new law.
The court allowed the ban to remain in place for a year until the governing Liberals could pass new legislation.
The grace period has now run out, and the Liberal’s Bill C-14 is still before the Senate with a vote not expected before Friday.
The High Court directed that assisted dying should be available to consenting adults with “grievous and irremediable” medical conditions who are enduring intolerable suffering.
However the government’s legislation is more restrictive, and hasn’t received smooth sailing through Parliament.
Expert compares missed assisted dying deadline to how feds have dealt with abortion laws
The feds failing to pass physician-assisted dying legislation by today’s deadline leaves the country in a legal grey area. It’s a similar situation to where the country stands on abortion.
Laws on that subject were deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada and struck down in 1988 without ever being replaced.
UBC political scientist Dr. Richard Johnston says that means an uneven system right now — similar to what we could see with assisted dying, at least in the short term.
“Abortion is not criminal, but neither is it uniformly acceptable. And it strikes me that you could have a very similar situation with assisted suicide — that it is available in some places, not in other place — and that means a pretty big inequity, whatever you think about the subject of the matter.”
But Johnston says there is one key difference:
“There was an existing system for the granting of therapeutic abortions, a kind of structure that was not wholly equitable that was already in place. Here, there isn’t — not yet. It’s conceivable that there will be some boundary cases and controversy because this really is uncharted territory.”
He expects Ottawa will pass legislation on assisted dying legislation before too long but admits there is a scenario where things could get a little tricky.
“What if the Senate comes up with an alternative piece of legislation and the government says ‘No, the House of Commons is the elected body and is the real sovereign and you should yield to us.’ Then we could start to have some political chaos, [a lengthy debate] or we have the vacuum [like what happened in 1988 on the issue of abortion].”
BC’s creates regulation to plug loopholes as it awaits passing of federal assisted dying legislation
Politicians here in BC are moving to ensure provincial regulations plug loopholes until the feds federal Liberals pass Bill C-14.
Health Minister Terry Lake says BC has created a regulation ensuring physicians in this province follow standards put in place by the BC College of Physicians and Surgeons.
“What we’ve done is really just an interim measure until the federal legislation is passed. It’s important to have a consistent approach across the country, and of course, federal legislation would always take precedence over provincial legislation. But we felt that we had to have some regulation in place until the federal government finally passes the legislation.”
Lake says doctors were told about the new BC regulation before the weekend.
