As Victoria all but passed laws in its state parliament last week allowing assisted dying, supporters of voluntary euthanasia in the ACT were reminded the territory belongs to a different category when it comes to legislating on the matter.
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Debate over the legislation, which will make Victoria the first and only Australian state allowing terminally ill people the right to ask to end their own lives, has become a battleground that has locked backers and opponents in disagreement for months. The passage of the laws is unlikely to end that.
They have also made the nation's laws uneven on an issue that arouses passionate argument, and has quickened a movement within Canberra to throw off the strictures of "the Andrews Bill", which prevents the territories legislating on euthanasia. Each by-product of Victoria's decision requires attention from Australia's federal lawmakers. Ignoring them risks prolonging and intensifying the debate.
While states have rightly grappled with voluntary euthanasia over the past year, their moves to resolve the quandary should lead into a national conversation on the practice. It may or may not bring about a uniform law across the country, but a nationally consistent position would avoid complicating how Australia handles the final stages of life for terminally ill people. The Victorian government says its legislation has safeguards against people travelling interstate for voluntary euthanasia. Nevertheless, differences on assisting dying laws send states and territories on separate paths with medical practice that would be better avoided.
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As it stands, Australia has neither a national conversation on assisted dying, nor does it allow an unfettered right to debate across all states and territories. The country's divergence on voluntary euthanasia isn't limited to the progress of each state's debates on the practice, but to the legislation that enables these arguments. This throws the spotlight on "the Andrews Bill", and deservedly so. Opposition is stirring in the Northern Territory, where Chief Minister Michael Gunner has written to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull asking that his territory regain the right to make its own euthanasia laws. In the ACT, there are also moves afoot against the restriction.
Labor and Greens politicians talking with federal counterparts about a cross-party bid to scrap it deserve support. Whatever the merits of "the Andrews Bill" in 1997, the legislation belongs to another time. When parliament passed the bill put forward by Coalition MP Kevin Andrews, the ACT had been self-governing for eight years, legislative childhood compared to the states. In the following 20 years, the territory has proved itself able to manage its finances and growth. Its population (about 400,000) is sized similarly to Tasmania's (520,000). While one was an original party to federation, the other has matured enough to determine for itself whether terminally ill people can choose to end their lives.
It's a matter of equality between states and territories. In the absence of a national approach to euthanasia, Canberrans shouldn't be denied the right to decide for themselves whether it should be practised where they live.