OTTAWA, April 14, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) — The majority Liberal government is backing down on its initial plan to whip the vote in favor of a forthcoming law that allows doctors to kill their patients.
It now says that it will allow MPs to vote on the controversial bill to be tabled today according to their consciences, reported the Globe and Mail today.
In February Liberal House Leader Dominic LeBlanc had told reporters that Liberal MPs would be forced to vote the party line in support of assisted suicide, a move that would guarantee the bill’s passage.
“At the end of the day, the Supreme Court has defined a right around the issue of assisted dying, and we will be always voting to uphold Charter rights,” he said at that time.
But the plan caused backlash among Liberal MPs, with some saying that forcing the passage of such legislation was not part of the mandate that got the government elected last year.
In February, a federal committee for euthanasia and assisted suicide released a number of controversial recommendations for the new law, including forcing Catholic and Christian hospitals to provide the procedure, forcing pro-life doctors opposed to the practice to provide an “effective referral,” and allowing “mature minors” to eventually be eligible for euthanasia.
According to the Globe and Mail, the government is planning on taking a more narrow approach in regulating the practice of a doctor killing a patient, and plans to ignore key recommendations made by the parliamentary committee.
Earlier this week, Liberal MP Rob Oliphant — the co-chair of the committee — urged the federal government to have the Supreme Court examine its new law governing the deadly practice to determine whether or not it complies with the Charter of Rights, a move that he said would give the court an opportunity to make sure the law is “broad enough.”
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