Bill C-314 to stop the expansion of MAiD

MP Ed Fast talks on the importance of Bill C-314 and what Canadians can do to stop the expansion of MAiD.

Transcript

[Music] hi everybody it's Chris weiberg the director of the national House of Prayer and I'm here today with MP Ed fast and we're here to talk about the mental protection act bill c314 so Ed would you like to tell us a little bit about this bill well this bill is focused on protecting the most vulnerable in our society which would be the mentally ill as you know for some time Canada has had assisted suicide or medical assistance in dying which was mandated by the Supreme Court of Canada and the Supreme Court said listen here are the essentials of what you have to include in legislation to allow people to use medically assisted death but the Senate chose to insert in the

most recent legislation a provision that includes mentally ill persons that includes those who are suffering from depressions including them in the scope of its medical assistance and dying regime and we know that there are many many issues that mental health professionals and the mental health Community have identified as being issues that have not been resolved things such as suicidality and whether mental illness is incurable which we know it isn't we know there are many Mental Health Professions have spoken out and said listen these things remain unresolved how could you move forward with assisted suicide for the mentally ill on that basis and there's a

suggestion from the liberal government that there's a consensus in Canada that we should move ahead and include the mentally ill in medical assistance and dying well I can tell you with absolute certainty from all the studies we've seen all the polls we've read all the mental health professionals we've interviewed that there's absolutely no consensus whatsoever that medical assistance invite should be extended to them mentally ill and in fact the consensus is the other way Canadians do not want to see this extended to the most vulnerable in our society so that my bill simply reverses what the government has done in including the mentally ill in this assisted suicide regime one of the

aspects that I I was reading the bill earlier today and one of the things that you said to put in place um legislation and and and structures to care and funding to care for mentally ill I think that's absolutely amazing well that's one of the challenges I think the government faces it claims to want to care for those who are most vulnerable in our society so we're talking about the poor yeah we're talking about the sick we're talking about the mentally ill the drug addicted veterans suffering from PTSD and yet we as a country have not delivered the supports that allow people that are vulnerable to live meaningful lives and until we get to that point where we can

say to Canadians listen we've provided you with the supports that you need to live these meaningful lives until we can say that why would we now consider using death as an alternative yeah that's not an alternative it is not a medical treatment yeah it is a final end to one's life and so I believe that we have gone too far too fast as a country and that there's no consensus to do this it's interesting that you know we've spoken over the years about made and it coming along and right now and the and the opponents of this type of thing from the beginning I remember 20 years ago they said this is a slippery slope if we go here and you know what it has turned into a slippery

slope it's turned into a full-blown luge almost it's a race to the bottom but I'm really grateful for this legislation how can we support you as Canadians what can we do as Canadians to to speak to our members of parliament well there are a number of things uh that your viewers can do one of course is to pray for us yeah we are the legislators for the country and at the end of the day it's about changing people's hearts yes and helping them understand the value of a human life um so prayer is really important uh there's another thing Canadians can do uh every so so many years we get a chance to vote Yes we choose the party and the government that we want to

represent us yeah the one thing I can say is that the leader of my party the conservative party Pierre polio yeah has said I like Ed fast bill yeah and if Ed fast Bill does not pass the House of Commons when we form government yeah he will introduce legislation that reverses what the government has done in extending medical assistance and dying to the mentally ill so we have a number of things that are available to us tools we have available to influence the decisions that government is making this those are some great well thank you Ed thank you for this today this is uh Chris viberg I'm here today with Ed fast I'm the member from Abbotsford it was good to see you we'll see you next time

bye for now [Music] foreign