BREAKING NEWS - NORTHERN TERRITORY'S LONG AWAITED VOLUNTARY ASSISTED DYING BILL TO BE INTRODUCED JULY-AUGUST
NT GOVERNMENT FINALLY ANNOUNCES RELEASE DATE
At a major Seniors Expo in Darwin yesterday hosted by the Council of the Ageing (COTA NT) in front of 2,000 attendees, the NT Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro stated that the long awaited Northern Territory draft Voluntary Assisted Dying bill will be introduced at the July/August sittings of the NT Parliament.
Council of the Ageing (COTA NT) CEO Sue Shearer told VAD Media Watch they have organised for the head of last year’s NT VAD Inquiry Dr Tanzil Rahman MLA (Member for Fong Lim) to speak about the draft legislation at a community forum on the 6th July at 10:00 am. Watch COTA NT’s website and Facebook page for release of full forum details.
The people of the Northern Territory were first in the world to enact Voluntary Assisted Dying legislation with the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act 1995. Just two years later it was cruelly taken from them by power-hungry Canberra conservatives who stripped both the Northern Territory (NT) and the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) of the right to legislate it using an anomaly in the way the Federation was set up to use Commonwealth power to permanently veto their democratic right to self govern.
That veto was not overturned until the Restoration of Territory Rights Bill 2022 was passed. The ACT acted quickly to enact their Voluntary Assisted Dying legislation which became operational in November last year, whilst the incoming NT Country Liberal Party (CLP) Government repeatedly said it was “not a priority”.
Then in May last year, Chair of the NT VAD Working Group Justine Davis, Independent Member for Johnston, forced the Government into responding to her motion that they support the comprehensive report by the previous Territory Labor Government which strongly recommended it be introduced.
The current NT Government responded by having another inquiry of their own - which also recommended Voluntary Assisted Dying legislation be returned to the Northern Territory..
The Northern Territory is currently the only jurisdiction in Australia without it.
It is wholeheartedly supported by the vast majority of Territorians who have waited 30 years and endured multiple inquiries seeking to have their world-first end-of-life rights restored.
It’s time to bring it home.
(Issued by Suzanne James, VAD Media Watch co-Editor and Convenor of the NT VAD Working Group chaired by NT Independent Member for Johnston Justine Davis.)