Media Release 12 January 2023 It is always wrong to kill another innocent human being, it violates the fifth commandment of our Creator, “Thou shalt not kill.”
The total prohibition of the killing of the innocent should be the foundation of the law and medicine.
Those who support the killing of the vulnerable do not deserve to sit in our Parliament.
Right to Life warns our community that it is the intention of David Seymour, to seek amendments to the End of Life Choice Act 2019 [EOLC Act] to:-
Remove the requirement that the patient has a terminal illness and has no more than six months to live. This requirement was included to gain the support of the Green Party for the [EOLC] bill.
Allow that doctors may kill their patients if permission is given in an advanced directive, for those who “have a grievous and irremediable medical condition, including an illness, disease or disability, that causes enduring suffering that is intolerable to the individual.”
Allow the requirement that the patient has a grievous and irremediable medical condition.
Information on the last two amendments was given by David Seymour to Right to Life in a letter of 28 November 2021, in response to our letter seeking confirmation of his intentions. His letter stated:-
“Of course, that is what the bill should read. I suspect we’ll give it a while until your fear mongering is mugged by reality, then we’ll press on.”
The End of Life Choice Act 2019 is due for review in 2024. Right to Life believes that if we have a change of government at the general election in 2023 that parliament could well be faced with a government bill to amend the EOLC Act to include the amendments sought by David Seymour and his ACT Party.
David Seymour continues with the charade that the legislation does not empower doctors to abandon, stop caring for their patients and to kill them, but merely to assist in their dying.
David Seymour claims that he wants to provide choice for those who are dying by allowing doctors to kill them in preference to caring for them. The hospice movement is in a financial crisis due to a lack of government funding and cannot provide the care to all those who seek it. Why is David Seymour silent in seeking increased funding to support the right of patients to choose palliative care?
Ken Orr,
Spokesperson,
Right to Life, NZ Inc.