“We would like to remind you that you have until October 11 to answer the Online Issue Book of the External Panel appointed by the federal government to advise the next government on legislative options for physician-assisted suicide following the Carter decision.”

This past July  the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, the Honourable Peter MacKay, and the Minister of Health, the Honourable Rona Ambrose, had announced the establishment of an External Panel of Experts who will consult with stakeholders and with all Canadians on options for dealing with the Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling that will effectively remove the prohibitions in the Criminal Code against assisted suicide.

For your information, “the External Panel on Options for a Legislative Response to Carter v. Canada on physician-assisted dying” has recently announced it has launched its online consultation. This consultation will remain open until October 11, 2015, and can be accessed at the following links:

English – http://www.ep-ce.ca/consultation/

French – http://www.ep-ce.ca/fr/consultation/

The online consultation has two components: (1) a section providing government-compiled information on voluntary euthanasia, assisted suicide, as well as palliative care, and (2)  a section where personal submissions can be made, including the uploading of documents, concerning the legislative response to Carter v. Canada. These public submissions will be reviewed by the panel.

When preparing submissions to the consultation, dioceses and eparchies may wish to consult the material developed for the “Life-Giving Love” Campaign, launched last September by the Catholic Organization for Life and Family with the endorsement of our Conference. If you have not already done so, you may also wish to distribute information about the “Life-Giving Love” Campaign throughout your parishes and on your diocesan website, in order to assist parishes or individual members of the faithful who may wish to respond to the consultation.

English: http://www.lifegivinglove.com/english

French: http://www.lifegivinglove.com/francais

On a further related point, the Expert Panel will be holding direct consultations with various stakeholders from across the country following the federal election on October 19, 2015. These stakeholders will primarily be those parties that had intervened before the Supreme Court in the Carter case. As you will recall, our President Paul-André Durocher, had written to the Minister of Justice on May 20, 2015, requesting that our Conference be among those to be consulted formally by the Government of Canada on this question. This past August 21, our President received an email on behalf of Mr. MacKay, acknowledging receipt of the President’s attached letter of May 20, 2015; assuring the President that his “views and concerns have been shared with appropriate departmental officials”; and indicating that the external independent panel has been established to conduct public consultations on physician-assisted suicide. From this it appears that the Expert Panel does not plan to include our Conference in its direct consultations. For your convenience and for possible future reference, I am attaching the English and French versions of the President’s letter from May, in case there are points in it which you may wish to use or adapt in your own submissions to the Expert Panel.

If you have suggestions on how the CCCB may assist dioceses and eparchies in the consultation process, these would be welcomed by our Executive and can be sent to my attention at the email address [email protected].    

Sincerely yours in Christ Our Lord,

(Rev.) Msgr. Patrick Powers, P.H.

General Secretary

Links to the letter to Peter McKay below

English Version of the letter click here
 French Version of the letter click here