A coalition of disability rights organizations has launched a Charter challenge against the federal government in Ontario’s Superior Court over a section of Canada’s assisted suicide law.
The group filed a notice of application to challenge what’s known as track two of the assisted suicide law on Thursday, a section which the group alleges has resulted in premature deaths.
Track two says that patients whose natural deaths aren’t reasonably foreseeable but who also suffer from an intolerable condition may apply for an assisted death.
Whereas, track one only includes MAID applications from patients whose natural death is reasonably foreseeable.
The group argues that track two is an “abandonment” of those that they represent.
“A law that allows people with disabilities to access state-funded death in circumstances where they cannot access state-funded supports they need to make their suffering tolerable is grossly disproportionate,” reads the coalition’s filing.
The group said that if someone with a disability is seeking assisted death due to poverty, social deprivation or a lack of essential supports, they should not be offered medically assisted suicide.
Instead, assisted suicide should only be available to those where natural death is reasonably foreseeable.
“There is no deprivation that is more serious and more irrevocable than causing someone who is not otherwise dying to die,” it said.
However, Department of Justice spokesperson Ian McLeod told the Canadian Press that assisted suicide was a “complex and deeply personal issue.”
“The government of Canada is committed to ensuring our laws reflect Canadians’ needs, protect those who may be vulnerable, and support autonomy and freedom of choice,” said McLeod. “We will further present the government’s position in our submissions in court.”
Among the groups involved in the Charter challenge are Inclusion Canada, the Council of Canadians with Disabilities, Indigenous Disability Canada and the Disabled Women’s Network of Canada.
There are two individual plaintiffs involved as well.
Executive vice-president of Inclusion Canada Krista Carr said that track two of the federal assisted suicide program has revealed the lack of support that people with disabilities face in Canada.
“The law has led people with disabilities ending their lives with so much life left to live because Canada has failed and refuses to provide the support they need,” said Carr during a news conference announcing the legal challenge.
“This isn’t compassion. It’s abandonment.”
The group noted that they don’t oppose the program entirely, just specifically track two of the law, which Carr believes “singles out” those with disabilities.
According to the challenge, the coalition alleges that track two does not require treatment options to be fully exercised before offering assisted suicide and that it may even “incentivize death” ahead of other options for people with disabilities.
“Death should not be a solution for disabled people who experience intolerable suffering but are otherwise not at the end of their lives,” it reads.
National chair of the Council of Canadians with Disabilities Heather Walkus said the government isn’t doing enough to listen to people with disabilities.
“People with disabilities are being not just pushed to the margins, but driven off the cliff unless services and supports are in place,” said Walkus.
She suffers from multiple sclerosis and vision loss and said while seeking treatment for a hip injury recently she was unexpectedly asked by a medical professional if she’d considered assisted suicide.
A question that Walkus found to be “stunning.”
“I don’t suffer because of my disability,” she said. “It’s other people’s perceptions, it’s the physical environment, the attitudinal environment, the policies and the support services, or lack of them – that’s what disables me and puts me in a position of suffering, not my disability.”