David Barber: Time has come to give ultimate human right

David Barber

Ken Orr (Is bill a breach of human rights? December 22) deliberately ignores the facts in claiming that David Seymour's End of Life Choice Bill infringes human rights.

The absolute opposite is true.

New Zealand's Human Rights Commission supported medically-assisted dying for the terminally ill subject to strict safeguards in its submission to the select committee inquiry conducted in the last Parliament.

The Attorney General in the last Government, Chris Finlayson, when exercising his obligation to review the legal validity of all proposed legislation, said specifically that Mr Seymour's bill would not infringe basic human rights if enacted.

Charged with assessing the impact of all potential laws under the Bill of Rights Act, Mr Finlayson said it was consistent with rights regarding freedom of conscience and freedom of expression.

He said that the eligibility criteria were narrow enough, and the safeguards strict enough; that the bill would not cause wrongful deaths and that assisted dying would be available only to the group the bill intended - the incurably or terminally ill, and in unbearable suffering.

And in Canada, the Supreme Court ruled in February 2015 that denying terminally ill patients who wanted medical assistance to end their suffering infringed their human rights. The court ordered the federal government to change the law so that it was no longer a crime to help those who met the criteria end their lives.

Canada is one of 11 enlightened jurisdictions around the world where people are able to get medical assistance to die if they are terminally ill and suffering intolerably. More than 110 million people in the United States now live under enlightened laws allowing death with dignity.

The state of Oregon has allowed it for 20 years and there have been no official complaints that its strict safeguards protecting the old, disabled and vulnerable are not working. Victoria has recently become the first Australian state to vote for a law change and boasts its 68 separate safeguards ensure the safest and most conservative legislation of its kind in the world.

New Zealand, once a nation of pioneering enlightened legislation and social justice, is on the wrong side of history on this issue.

It has been 31 years since our Parliament adopted homosexual law reform, prostitution was decriminalised in 2003 and same-sex marriage was legalised four years ago.

Scientifically-conducted opinion polls consistently show that at least three-quarters of all voters want criminal laws changed to allow the terminally ill to end their intolerable suffering with a medically-assisted death.

This would enable them to die peacefully and painlessly at a time of their choosing in the company of family and friends after a loving farewell.

The time has come for New Zealanders to acquire the ultimate human right of the 21st century - the right to die with dignity. We have until February 20 to make submissions to Parliament's Justice Select Committee demanding this right.

David Barber is the spokesman, Newsletter Editor and a National Committee member of the End-of-Life Choice Society of NZ Inc. Views expressed here are the writer's opinion and not the newspaper's. Email: editor@hbtoday.co.nz