Auckland seniors divided on End of Life Choice Bill

Seniors and those who work with elderly are strongly divided on support for a new euthanasia bill.

David Seymour's End of Life Choice bill was drawn from the ballot for private member's bills, although it was unlikely to be debated before Parliament breaks for the general election.

The bill gives adults with a terminal illness, or a grievous and irremediable medical condition, the option of requesting medical aid in dying.

Seymour said motivation for the bill was compassion and safeguards would include two doctors having to sign off that the person genuinely wished to end their life. Patients must be in an advanced state of irreversible decline in capability and experiencing unbearable suffering that cannot be relieved.

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At a meeting in Auckland's Takapuna on Thursday, Minister for Seniors and North Shore MP Maggie Barry said she was inclined to vote against the bill but wanted to know what constituents thought.

Barry said she thought the bill did not have enough safeguards for vulnerable people, particularly seniors, who could be coerced into ending their life.

"It does not protect the vulnerable. In order for some people to have a choice about their end-of-life care, that choice is going to be removed for some people," she warned.

"We need to be very, very careful about what we allow to go through in law."

Having been a sponsor of a hospice in Wellington, Barry said the end of life need not be full of suffering, if people got the right palliative care.

She said she had never seen any euthanasia legislation, anywhere in the world, that adequately protected the vulnerable.

The room was divided about whether or not to support the bill.

One woman opened up to say she was in favour of the bill, as she wanted to make a choice about how she died.

The woman said she had nursed family members as they died, including her husband. "All of those people died the death of a dog, despite hospice care," she said.

"I think each of us in this room deserves to make the choice for ourselves; those who choose to breathe to the bitter end can do so. I will choose another way, in my own time."

But Marguerite Sakey, a palliative care worker, said she disagreed with the bill, calling it "hideous".

After the meeting, she said, in 24 years of palliative care, she had never had a patient who had asked to be euthanased.

However, when Sakey interviewed family members after the person had died, about 3 to 4 per cent of family members were in support of euthanasia.

"We can't generalise but the percentage would have to rest with the family, rather than the patient."