Media Release 3 November 2021
Right to Life encourages the Christian community to dedicate Sunday 7th November as a day of prayer in reparation to our Creator for the offence given to God with the introduction of the killing of the vulnerable terminally ill with a lethal injection or the assisting in their suicide. Life is a precious gift of our Creator and He has commanded us in the fifth commandment, “Thou shalt not kill”, we ignore Him at our peril. We should also pray for God’s protection of the medical profession that they will uphold their ethic to do no harm and reject the killing of patients as a treatment option. That they too will not be seduced by the Minister of Health, Andrew Little and his generous financial inducement to doctors to participate in the killing of their patients.
We need to pray for God’s protection for the most vulnerable in our community, the aged the seriously ill and the handicapped, whom we fear, from overseas experience, may soon become victims of this insatiable monster that has been unleashed on our community.
Sunday 7th November is a day that will be recorded in our nation’s history as a day of shame and trepidation.
For on this day the End of Life Choice Act will have commenced its reign of terror among the most vulnerable members of our community.
This is the Bill sponsored by David Seymour of ACT, that became law because it had overwhelming support at its third reading of 33 Labour MPs, total support from the Greens with 8 MPs, NZ First with 9 MPs and 17 MPs from National.
We must not ever forget the shameful progress of this bill through Parliament. It passed its first reading 76 to 44 on the 13th December 2017. It was then referred to the Justice Select Committee that received 39,000 written submissions, 91.8% opposed to euthanasia and this bill.
The Committee also heard 3,600 oral submissions with 85% being opposed to the bill. In view of the overwhelming opposition to the bill the Select Committee reported back to Parliament that it could not recommend that the bill be passed. The bill passed its 2nd reading 70 to 50 on 26th June 2019. The bill was finally passed at its 3rd reading 69 to 51 on 13 November 2019.
The Act was subject to a national referendum at the general election on 17th October 2020.
Right to Life believes that the government’s information programme, ostensibly to inform the community of the consequences of the Act was misleading and biased.
A poll conducted in New Zealand between 31 October and 6 November 2019 by Curia Marketing on behalf of Euthanasia Free New Zealand revealed the following disturbing findings on what the End of Life Choice Bill would provide.
- 85% thought that it included turning off life support
- 79% thought it includes ‘do not resuscitate’ (no CPR) requests
- 67% thought it includes the stopping of medical tests, treatments and surgeries.
The End of Life Choice Act does NOT make it legal to turn off life support, to make a ‘do-not-resuscitate’ request (no CPR) or to stop medical treatment.
These end-of-life choices are already legal and are not euthanasia. In these situations, a patient would die of natural causes – from their underlying medical condition.
The End of Life Choice Act is NOT about pain relief.
It’s already legal for a doctor to give a person enough medication to address their pain and make them comfortable, even if this may hasten their death as a side effect as the doctor seeks to neither hasten or cause the death of his patient.
This poll demonstrates that the public was not yet aware of the content and meaning of the End of Life Choice Act. We believed that in order to have a fully informed public referendum on this critical issue of allowing doctors to give patients a lethal injection or to assist in their suicide, it was essential that the above information be included on the government Referendum website.
Right to Life wrote to the Minister of Justice, Andrew Little requesting that this information be displayed on the government web site, the Minister refused. Right to Life believes that if the government had sought to properly inform the community of this critical information the referendum would have been soundly defeated.
Ken Orr,
Spokesperson,
Right to Life N.Z. Inc.