Little AndrewHon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Justice): Thank you Mr Speaker. I rise to say that I will be voting for this bill for a number of reasons that have already been canvassed by this House. I want to begin by acknowledging the sponsor of the bill David Seymour. I want to acknowledge the work of the Justice Committee and I don't think there will have been a piece of legislation that has exercised the time and effort and energy of a select committee in this House for some considerable time; so thank you to the committee members for that. Can I also acknowledge a former member of this House Maryan Street who was the first to champion this cause and champion legislation for this cause when she was in this House previously.This debate about this bill is not about alternatives to or substitutes for palliative care. I think we have to be very careful in this debate that we don't set up these false alternatives. Of course palliative care has a place and will continue to have a place in the healthcare of those who are suffering and dying in this country. So it is not about an alternative to or a substitute for palliative care. This is not a debate about suicide in the sense that we understand that those who are in a state of despair or depression or who have just given up because of the circumstances of their life and who can see no further way forward—that is not what this bill is about. This bill is about those people whose health condition is such that they have no future. They are terminal but more than that the quality of their life has gone. They have their faculties they are capable of making up their mind they are capable of making a decision and the question is whether we should allow the law as it is at the moment to stand in their way to make a decision of their choice about how they wish to meet their inevitable end. That's what this bill provides for.Some say it doesn't provide safeguards or enough safeguards. When Maryan Street first had a draft bill the reason why I was supportive of it and why I have been supportive of David Seymour's bill is exactly because I looked at the safeguards and I was satisfied that the safeguards are there. It requires the person who is making the choice to meet a number of criteria: first of all that they are capable of making a decision. Someone in a state of despair is not capable of making that decision. So they have to be capable of making a decision. That they consult their medical practitioner—and not just one medical practitioner but two and possibly three and not just once but throughout the time it takes when they make their decision up to the time that it is carried out. The medical practitioner or practitioners are required to regularly review with the person the decision they have said they wish to make.Those safeguards are there but more than that as a result of the debate that was carried out in front of select committee members as they traversed the country and heard the submissions new ideas were put up about strengthening the safeguards. Had the select committee—and I cast no blame when I say this—been in a position to propose improvements and amendments to the bill maybe some of those strengthened parts of the safeguards would be in the bill now but they're not.The sponsor of the bill David Seymour has already foreshadowed improvements that he sees he can make in the bill. In the absence of the committee itself being able to make those decisions and put in front of us those improvements let this House in the committee of the whole House stage have the chance to have the fulsome debate—clause by clause line by line—draw on the submissions that the select committee has heard and see if we can agree on improvements to the bill even as it is at the moment because I'm confident that with all of the wisdom of this House we will be able to do so.As I said it is clear that this bill could be improved. That is not an impediment to this House at this second reading stage voting down this bill. This bill represents the opportunity for that small number of people who are in a position to reflect on themselves their health when it is at a terminal stage their loss of quality of life to make a decision about how they bring that to an end.We've heard some wonderful moving and touching stories of personal experiences of members. I remember my father when he died 17 years ago. He was an Englishman. He was a former officer in the British army so nothing was going to stop him seeing himself through to the end of his days. He had a terminal illness and the last years of his life were frankly a misery for him and my mother and for me and my siblings. Every time we went home we did our bit to support Dad but I knew he was suffering. He knew he was suffering but his spirit was such that he would not give up. He was the sort of man who was there literally for the last breath and as I saw him in his dying hours on his bed in the hospice struggling to take those last breaths clearly in pain he was not going to give up.His story is when we were all gathered around hour after hour late at night—and he was still there still struggling for those last breaths—the nurse came in and said Oh look he's got a wee way to go yet. If you want to go home and get some sleep do that." So we all toddled off and went home and within an hour we got the phone call: "He's passed." But that was dad. You see he was proud—he was proud—and I see now that he did not want to take his final breath in front of all of us. But he made that decision. We knew that that was how he felt.But I've also seen others and I am good friends with others who have seen their parents in frankly diabolical situations where their parents have said "It's terminal. I can't move my body. I can't move my legs. I can't do anything to take care of myself. This is not who I am. I am totally rational and I'm not angry I'm not in despair but this is not who I am. I am close to the end and I would like to control that end." The law we have on our statute book today prevents someone in that situation from taking that step from making that decision and I don't think that is right.In a country like ours that respects the dignity of the person the dignity of the individual why would we allow our law to deprive somebody of that final decision of that control of their life? That is why I will be voting for this bill and I will work hard with others if we get to the committee of the whole House stage to strengthen the protections in the bill to make the best bill and create the best framework that we possibly can around this very sensitive very delicate issue.I end on this point. As we come to this debate as all those who came to the select committee did with their submissions we bring our values we bring our faith and we bring our experiences and our various perspectives to it. This is a debate that clearly ignites a great deal of passion as it should but in the way that we all bring those values and our respective faiths to this debate because of what we foresee will be decisions—or might be decisions—that people will want to take so it is that somebody in the position of wanting to exercise that choice to bring their life to an end will bring their values and their faith and their experiences and their perspectives to that decision too. We should not be preventing them or creating a constraint or a restriction on anybody from seeing through their values their views and their faith however they choose to profess it to express it or to practise it in making a decision of this magnitude. So on that basis I think it is time for us to support the right for those to make a decision."