Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

We've just had three contributions on this matter from colleagues with a great depth of experience, both in this place and on this topic, that I can't hope to mirror, and it is very worthwhile. For me, as someone who has been in this place for five short months, it is good to hear the words of much more experienced colleagues on what is a very difficult policy area. Obviously, it is a matter that has been considered in this parliament and in various state and territory parliaments quite a few times over the years, and we've recently seen a very protracted debate on legislation in this area in Victoria.

As a starting point, though, I would point out that the bill we're currently looking at is not actually about euthanasia; it is more about state and territory rights. The bill is called the Restoring Territory Rights (Assisted Suicide Legislation) Bill 2015. The explanatory memorandum states:

The purpose of the Restoring Territory Rights (Assisted Suicide Legislation) Bill 2015 is fourfold.

First, it reduces the extent of Commonwealth interference with the laws of the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory.

Second, it will encourage competitive federalism—the process whereby each state enacts laws in competition with the others—thereby refining and improving law-making.

Third, it recognises the right of the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory to legislate for assisted suicide in their respective jurisdictions.

Fourth, it ensures that the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act (NT) is not automatically revivified, allowing the Parliament of the Northern Territory to revisit the issue in a time and manner of its choosing.

As previous speakers have said—and I think it is important to repeat—this is a very sensitive, complex topic; one that engenders a lot of strong community feelings, and one that's been extensively debated in this place. But the issue of territories' rights, in particular, is one that should not merely be viewed through the prism of states' rights.

We do have a Federation, made up of six states and two territories. There is a reason why we have six states and two territories, not six states or eight states. The Federation came into existence on 1 January 1901—inspired by the US constitution, certainly. It was the coming together of the six British colonies seeking their independence from Great Britain, envisaging the benefits of unrestricted trade throughout the Federation and the benefits of a combined armed force, a single currency and a single rate of export excise. But they also wanted to retain certain powers for themselves, not to be usurped by a central government. Those of us who are federalists—and I acknowledge that Senator Leyonhjelm is a federalist—recognise that, over time, these powers have been significantly eroded by successive decisions of the High Court. The powers of the Commonwealth have been significantly expanded through that process, and the areas in which the Commonwealth has taken an active role have been significantly expanded.

However, I don't think we should, through that process, automatically assume that the rights of territories are those of states. As I've stated, legislation has recently been passed in Victoria in the area of euthanasia. That is completely correct, in that it was the right of the Victorian parliament to pass those laws, and of the citizens of Victoria to now live under those laws. However, the territories have a different status. They are a different legal entity under our Constitution, and were never envisaged to have the same rights or responsibilities as the states. I think there is a broader discussion that we should have, Senator Leyonhjelm, about the future of the territories within the Commonwealth and how that should change over time. But I think that is beyond the topic of this bill, and certainly beyond the more narrow issue of discussing euthanasia.

When you're dealing with euthanasia, I think it's very important to recognise that this is a topic that invokes a lot of passion. It's an area where, I think, people's views have changed over time and are probably different at different stages in their lives. I often think about this issue in parallel with the issue of capital punishment. As a younger man, I didn't have any particular moral objection to capital punishment. But, over time, I came to realise that, regardless of my position on capital punishment, the legal system could not be made robust enough for capital punishment to be used within Western societies in a way that would stand any sort of robust examination. We've seen in the US a number of states move away from capital punishment for that reason—because it has been shown that the legal system failed to provide adequate checks and balances to ensure that this ultimate punishment of the state could be used effectively.

And I think this is the problem many have in the area of euthanasia. Regardless of how you feel about the topic itself, can we be certain that we can craft a legal regime that will actually provide adequate protections to people, particularly those in the most vulnerable of circumstances: people with either a diagnosed or an undiagnosed mental illness or people who are in a lot of pain? We heard from previous speakers about the importance of palliative care and the importance of pain management, and I certainly would echo those thoughts. It's an area where I think that, as a society and as a medical profession and a health system, we probably need to look at doing more.

Pain is certainly one of those areas where there is some quite remarkable work being done by researchers. I was meeting in my office during National Science Week with a young researcher who was looking at some very new, highly targeted ways of delivering pain management drugs within the brain. Obviously, technologies like that are very exciting and can potentially be a significant game changer in this area, as we give people who are in very desperate circumstances new options, new opportunities, new ways of dealing with the very serious and confronting problems they face.

This is why it has to always be an underlying principle of any government, and certainly this government, to continue to invest in quality of life through our health systems and, as I said, particularly in palliative care and pain management. People need access to quality palliative care. They need to be able to gain relief from pain and suffering, and, where possible, they should be able to choose the extent of active medical treatment they receive.

Euthanasia has been a matter for state parliaments, and that is—as I stated earlier in terms of the place of federalism in our structures of government—how it should be dealt with. The territories, as I've stated, lie in a slightly different category. I think that we need to ensure that, when we consider these issues, we do so from a holistic viewpoint, not merely based on the idea that we are in some way restoring territories' rights. In my view of federalism, those rights did not exist in the way they are described in this bill in the first place. They were rights that were provided for in the Constitution for the states. The territories are not states, and therefore the rights do not flow in the same way.

The Commonwealth government is carefully considering the interaction between the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017, which was recently passed in Victoria, and relevant Commonwealth provisions. I think that is something that we need, obviously, to keep an eye on. I think that as a parliament and as a government it's important to look at the operation of laws in other jurisdictions. Regardless of where you stand on the issue itself, we now have laws in place in Victoria. We need to monitor those. We need to watch how that is changing the environment for people who perhaps choose to act under those laws. I think we need to keep a watching brief on this topic.

But when this topic does come up in federal parliament at some point in the future, and I suspect it probably will, I think we do need to take a very holistic view of this issue and look at all the interactions of the various legal systems. In the main, I think this should be a matter that we leave to state governments. I don't think that we need to revisit the debates of the late nineties in this area at this point, and I don't think this bill would be the correct manner in which to do it. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.