Euthanasia Bill

* Greens leader Bob Brown has introduced a bill into the Senate to return to the Territories the ability to legislate on the issue of euthanasia. * Debate on the bill has already begun, and MPs have been granted a conscience vote. * Visit our ‘Care not Killing’ campaign to sign the petition against euthanasia. Dear ACL Supporter Debate on Bob Brown’s bill to restore to the Territories the ability to legalise euthanasia began in the Senate last week. We need your help to rebuff this latest push by the Greens to introduce euthanasia law.

Please sign the online petition against euthanasia and write a short email to your Senate representatives letting them know that you are opposed to Bob Brown’s bill, which would devalue human life and put vulnerable people at risk.

The bill would overturn a 1997 bill – the ‘Andrews’ amendment’ – which itself overturned the Northern Territory’s short-lived Rights of the Terminally Ill [voluntary euthanasia] Act. Bob Brown has marketed his Restoring Territory Rights (Voluntary Euthanasia Legislation) Bill 2010 as being entirely about granting citizens of the Territories the same ‘right’ to determine their own legislation on euthanasia as citizens of the states, but this is misleading. If the bill were passed euthanasia supporters would target the Territory parliaments, which are smaller and have fewer checks and balances than most states. A legislative ‘success’ in a Territory would have national ramifications, keeping euthanasia firmly on the political radar and pressuring other jurisdictions to follow suit.

This is why ‘Care not Killing’ is one of ACL’s most important ever campaigns. Our petition has already attracted over 1400 signatures, but a massive response is needed to send a clear message to Federal politicians that placing the lives of vulnerable elderly, sick and depressed Australians is just not on.

Please sign the petition against euthanasia, and also alert your friends, family and colleagues to the campaign. We ask for your help in seeing this terrible bill defeated.

Lyle Shelton ACL Chief of Staff