SoVote

Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 281

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 13, 2024 10:00AM
  • Feb/13/24 4:00:31 p.m.
  • Watch
Mr. Speaker, I sympathize with my colleague’s story about one of his constituents. However, using specific cases to try to advance ideological views is not how we move forward in a debate. Since this morning, I have been hearing the Conservatives talk about medical assistance in dying as if the process were like renting a movie on Netflix. This is not how it works. Legislators are expected to stand back a bit and place the public good before their personal ideology. I know people who have sought medical assistance in dying. It is a medical procedure like many others that must be weighed. I would advise my colleague to place the common good before his ideological interests. Perhaps we would all grow if we worked this way.
129 words
  • Hear!
  • Rabble!
  • star_border
  • Feb/13/24 6:52:30 p.m.
  • Watch
Madam Speaker, I will try to be polite because I thought my colleague's speech was quite exaggerated. That is not surprising, because I have heard his leader say in the past that people are requesting MAID because they do not have enough to eat. When the leader is so flippant, it is easy to understand why a member would frame MAID as a conspiracy against life, as a culture of death, as a war of the most powerful against the weak. I would like to pick up on what my colleague was saying. I get the impression that, if we had let him continue a bit longer, he was going to tell us that contraception was also one of those conspiracies against life. I just want to be clear with my colleague. He began his speech by telling us that people might request MAID because they were afraid of being a burden. I just want to let him know, having been through this with family members, that it is because people are afraid of suffering. When we love someone who is suffering and we know that the end is near, we try to do everything possible to make them comfortable. I do not think he understands that.
208 words
  • Hear!
  • Rabble!
  • star_border