Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to this bill, the Restoring Territory Rights (Assisted Suicide Legislation) Bill 2015, which seeks to undo a decision of this parliament 21 years ago. The vote on this bill is, rightly, a conscience issue because good people across Australia have strongly held views on both sides of this argument. Personally, I will vote against this bill, and that is because, as a matter of deep personal conviction and faith, I am committed to upholding the dignity of human life.

There is no circumstance in which I could or would vote in support of any bill which would either directly or indirectly legalise or facilitate the state sanctioned taking of a human life. Of course, like all in this chamber, I want to see the right care and support available for our terminally ill. I want to see high-quality care for those that go through this very difficult process as they approach the end of their life—the appropriate pain relief and palliative care to help facilitate dying with dignity. But I cannot support the official, state sanctioned, deliberate taking of a human life. It goes against everything I believe to be right. I do not believe there is a safe way that it can be legislated. I do not believe it can be legislated in a way which provides the appropriate protections to the vulnerable, depressed or the poor.

Some have argued that this is not a bill to legalise assisted suicide or euthanasia but rather a bill to uphold states' rights. I would submit to the Senate that this is objectively wrong. Firstly, by definition, the territories are not states; they are territories. Under section 122 of our Constitution, the power to make laws for the government of any territory rests with the Commonwealth parliament. Having the constitutional power gives us the constitutional responsibility. We can't abrogate that responsibility. If we, as the Commonwealth parliament, vote in favour of this legislation, we are effectively voting in favour of legalising assisted suicide, except that we're doing so without having any capacity to influence the circumstances and the framework within which that is then done. We would be delegating the power to legalise assisted suicide to the territories. We would be abrogating our responsibility to ensure it is done in an appropriate way. As I say, I'm opposed to state-sanctioned assisted suicide. But even those who are in favour should ask themselves the question whether they are comfortable with being responsible for whatever form that state-sanctioned assisted suicide takes on the other side of a process in the Australian Capital Territory assembly or the Northern Territory assembly, over which we then no longer have any influence.

It is also important to remember that, in the year after the Andrews bill—which this bill seeks to overturn—became law back in 1997, the Northern Territory had the opportunity to become a state. The people of the Northern Territory, by majority vote, chose not to do so. If a majority of the people in the Northern Territory back in 1998, the year after the Commonwealth took away the Northern Territory's power to keep euthanasia legal, were offended by that and wanted to preserve their right to make laws into the future to legalise assisted suicide, then surely they would have voted in favour of statehood, which would have removed the constitutional power of the Commonwealth to continue to maintain the prohibition that is currently legislated. I put it to the chamber that the fact that, on the back of the federal parliament's intervention, they did not do so shows that the people of the Northern Territory at the time supported the actions of the federal parliament at that time.

In conclusion, I will vote no both as a matter of deep personal conviction and faith as well as on the basis that I do not feel comfortable to abrogate the responsibility to get the framework and safeguards right, if assisted suicide were to be legislated, to either the Australian Capital Territory or the Northern Territory. I don't believe that there is a safe way to legalise assisted suicide in a way that would not inappropriately expose the vulnerable, the depressed and the poor to inappropriate pressures. Finally, given that the Constitution gives the Australian parliament the power to enact this legislation, I believe we have a responsibility to maintain the legislation as it currently stands and not to undo the decision, which I believe was the right decision back in 1997, to prevent the territories from legislating state-sanctioned taking of human life.