We've been litigating the right to die issue for more than two decades.
Now we're almost done.
Back in the early 1990s Sue Rodriguez, a B.C. woman with ALS, demanded but was denied the right to have a doctor help end her life.
Lengthy court battles in B.C. involving Gloria Taylor and Kathleen Carter, both now deceased, led the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association and others to take their case for doctor-assisted death all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. Their argument was simple. Attempted suicide was decriminalized in 1972. Able-bodied people can end their life if they choose to do so. The disabled often can't. The law discriminates against those with a physical disability who might need physical assistance to exercise their right to take their own life.
Two weeks ago the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms' "right to life" doesn't require an absolute prohibition on assistance in dying and ruled that the law that makes it illegal for anyone to help people end their own lives should be amended to allow doctors to help in specific situations.
The court has given the federal government and related federal agencies 12 months to craft legislation to respond to the ruling. The current ban on assisted suicide stands until then. If the government doesn't write a new law the court's exemption will stand.
We've been down this road before. In 1988 the court struck down Canada's abortion law and gave parliamentarians time to craft a new law. They never did so. As a result, abortions in Canada are legal and are a matter between the patient and the physician.
Is there a lesson here? My view is that a person's choice to seek assistance to end their life should also be legal and that decision should be between a patient and their physician.
The best response to the court ruling, in my opinion, is for the government to do nothing and let the exemption for doctors stand.
The court ruled that a person granted a request for assisted death must meet four conditions. They must be in intolerable pain. They must have a permanent condition. They must be legally capable of consent. And they must "clearly consent."
It's not the court's job to tell the government or Canadians how to make their ruling work and in this case thankfully the court didn't.
We do need safeguards in place to ensure that when it comes to end of life decisions the most vulnerable persons in our society are protected. Conservative MP Stephen Fletcher's proposal to create a Canadian commission on physician-assisted death, an independent body that would establish the practical rules or guidelines for administering physicianassisted death, is a step in the right direction.
There will always be those who are opposed to assisted death. Those who have watched a loved one suffer for any length of time at the end of their life will welcome the Supreme Court's decision.
A combination of allowing some doctors to help people end their own lives in specific situations, with the proper oversights in place, may be the best we can do. We could certainly do worse.
Tom Carney is the former executive director of the Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society. Ideas for future columns are welcome. [email protected]
