Smith NickHon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): Thank you Mr Speaker. I want to begin by acknowledging the thousands of New Zealanders who submitted to our select committee on this bill both for and also against. The submissions we heard were compelling they were heartfelt and some of them were heart breaking. Ninety-two percent or over 35000 of those submissions were opposed. And Parliament needs to be cautious of overriding such strong opposition.The problem I have with this bill is it's out of step with a core part of our Kiwi culture: that respect for human life. In many parts of the world life's cheap but here we go to extraordinary lengths to protect human life. It's actually not that New Zealanders are puritanical or deeply religious. It's actually a very down to earth practical caring. It's why we've been a world leader in an area like the Special Olympics and disability rights in asserting that every life has value. It's why we were one of the first countries in the world to get rid of the death penalty. We want to err on the side of life. The cold calculating clauses in this bill allowing the termination of the life of someone who's unwell or disabled contradicts those basic Kiwi values.This sort of intuitive view is actually backed up by the experts. The most powerful submissions for me are those palliative care doctors and nurses that all over New Zealand every day care for dying Kiwis. No one can doubt their professionalism or their compassion. They were adamant and consistent in their opposition to this bill. You see the problem with euthanasia is that it's one of those ideas that superficially sounds quite attractive but the more you look into the detail the more sceptical you become. Hundreds of doctors backed up by their representative organisations made submissions opposing this bill. They have absolutely no difficulty with patients rightly making an informed choice to refuse treatment or of using medication for the purposes of pain relief that may in fact bring forward the time of death. Their concern is about legalising the administration of drugs with the deliberate purpose of killing a patient. The deadly flaw in this bill is that it assumes a level of certainty in medical judgments that actually just doesn't exist in real life. Its clauses require that a doctor certifies that a person is free of mental illness or depression that they've not been unduly influenced by others or that they have only six months to live. It assumes that those judgments are 100 percent accurate. They are not. It is inevitable if we pass this bill that there will be fatal mistakes.I was also unnerved by the extensive international evidence we heard from jurisdictions that have passed such laws. Advocates say that this bill is about alleviating pain yet the experience in those jurisdictions is that the most common reason given for requesting assisted suicide is concern of being a burden on their family or a community. I do not want a society in which people feel guilty for living.We also need to heed the message of disability advocates. They have worked tirelessly over the decades to ensure that our society values people with disabilities. The provisions in this bill that enable people with an irremediable condition to access assisted suicide is the State saying that suicide is OK for these people. It is blatantly saying in law that their lives are of lesser value than others.I also worry like others about the mixed signals we are sending on one of the biggest challenges our country faces: over 600 New Zealanders each year taking their own life. This law change erodes the value that we put on life by saying it's OK for some to end their life. It blurs the message that actually life is precious.I also reject the ACT Party's rampant individualism in the detail of this bill that ignores the importance of family. It entitles someone to take their own life without their partner their children or other loved ones even knowing about it until after the event. Family is the greatest institution ever invented and actually it's at its most important at the beginning and at the end of life.It became plain in listening to the submissions on this bill that there is a fear that many deaths involve extensive pain and suffering that will be alleviated by assisted suicide; that's not supported by the evidence. We heard from palliative care specialists who have cared for thousands of dying patients that it is extremely rare for pain not to be managed. And of course the technology and the medication associated with pain relief continues to improve. I acknowledge people including myself are fearful of a painful death but as lawmakers we must legislate on the basis of the facts and not the perceptions.We should also be concerned about the inherent instability in the legal criteria as to who is eligible for assisted suicide. Mr Seymour was very confident a year ago that he had the criteria his words exactly right". Now he's proposing extensive changes. The same has occurred overseas as the criteria have had to change. The problem is that once we cross the line into the grey zone of assisted suicide being OK drawing a line is actually fraught with difficulty. If it's not OK for an 18-year-old to suffer what about a 17-year-old? If it's not OK for a person with Parkinson's disease what about multiple sclerosis? If it's OK for the quadriplegic well what about the paraplegic?This bill uses the phrase "unbearable suffering that cannot be relieved in a manner that the person considers tolerable". Every person will have a different view of what is tolerable. The problem with the ideology of individual choice on this issue is that we end up drifting to a point where anybody can request assisted suicide.Now we've all had our own experiences with the death of loved ones. I had a dying friend. When I sat beside him he was unconscious. I held his hand and actually reflected and said to myself "I wonder whether Dave is all right?" because he was in such an awful emancipated state. He woke up and we had a most wonderful 10 minutes of laughs and remembrance that I will remember for the rest of my life and for me it was my being uncomfortable with his state rather than actually being focused on the needs of the dying. My point on this issue is that the answer is to focus on ensuring quality care as with hospices. Last month I was with the Prime Minister and we opened a wonderful new hospice in my community that is supported by hundreds of volunteers. The hospices' sound philosophy of making people's last days as comfortable and fulfilling as possible is actually the right answer to this issue. My plea to Parliament is to reject this bill. I do not doubt it is motivated by genuine compassion but it is mistaken. It might make death more convenient but it will not make New Zealand more caring. It will make our job of tackling suicide more difficult. It will make our most vulnerable citizens like our elderly and our disabled more vulnerable. We should leave the lid of this Pandora's box of legalising assisted suicide firmly closed. This is the truly caring and compassionate society I want New Zealand to be. Focus on quality hospice care and reject this notion of assisted suicide."