On Friday 4 December 2020 Tasmanian lower house MPs voted 17 - 7 for the End of Life Choices (Voluntary Assisted Dying) Bill 2020 to proceed to the committee stage of the debate. Labor and the Greens voted unanimously in support of the bill, and...
On Tuesday 10 October 2020 Tasmania's Upper House passed laws to legalise voluntary assisted dying in a final vote that was unanimous. Independent MP Mike Gaffney's End-of-Life Choices (Voluntary Assisted Dying) Bill 2020 was amended during the upper house debate however those amendments led to the...
On Sunday 18 October 2020 Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, used her election campaign launch to announce that a re-elected Labor government would table voluntary assisted dying legislation in February 2021. It was a calculated announcement that elevated the issue of assisted dying law reform at a key...
A long-running parliamentary inquiry into end of life related issues has recommended that a scheme to allow voluntary assisted dying is legislated in Queensland. The recommendation is included in a report that was tabled on Tuesday 31 March 2020 by the parliament’s Health Committee. Committee chair, Mr Aaron Harper MP,...
On Wednesday 19 February the Victorian Voluntary Assisted Dying Review Board released a report covering the first six months of the operation of the Victoria’s Voluntary Assisted Dying Act. In the six months from 19 June to 31 December 2019, 136 people commenced the assessment process for VAD through...
Tasmanian Legislative Council independent, Mike Gaffney, has released a draft consultation voluntary assisted dying bill with the intention of introducing the legislation for debate in August. The End-of-LIfe Choices (Voluntary Assisted Dying) Bill 2020 aims to provide a voluntary assisted dying process for people deemed eligible...
Our Summer 2019 Newsletter aims to bring everyone up-to-date with the latest developments from across Australia and around the world. We held back publication of this newsletter so we could include the exciting news from Western Australia. On Tuesday 10 December the WA Parliament passed their...
On Tuesday 10 December 2019 the Western Australian Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill 2019 cleared its final parliamentary hurdle making Western Australian the second state after Victoria to legalise voluntary assisted dying for the terminally ill. It took five hours for the Legislative Assembly to work its way...
It's six years since I was diagnosed with lung cancer and still hard to believe how this could have happened to me, a very healthy, 60-year-old non-smoker. Now looking through the narrowing window of treatment options left, I know I don’t want to die as just...
On 9 July 2019, 61-year-old Kerry Robertson became the first Australian to be granted a permit for voluntary assisted dying under the Victorian Voluntary Assisted Dying law. Just six days later, on 15 July, she was dispensed the lethal medication and chose to take it...