Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank our four guests for sharing their very personal stories. While I was not here in the committee room, I was tuned into proceedings in my office upstairs. I listened attentively to each and every one of their stories. I thank them for sharing them with us.

In life, we are all framed or influenced by our own past experiences. Death is something everyone experiences at some stage or another. My personal experience is that sadly I lost two of my siblings to cancer. One was aged 36 and the other 34. To their dying day, both craved more treatment and wanted to live, far more so than they wanted to die. The contributions from the witnesses have highlighted to me the challenges faced by us as committee members as to how we get this right.

Having listened to what has been said, it is fair to say we have three witnesses advocating some form of assisted dying and one who is vehemently opposed to it. Even from those three witnesses advocating some form of assisted dying, the words I took from their contributions include "restrictive", "safeguards", "robust" and "the Swiss model". I do not think, therefore, that anyone is advocating for a model such as that in use in Belgium, where all that is needed to avail of assisted dying is for someone to be 74 years old. What is being advocated is a restrictive and robust model with safeguards, predominantly for people who have end-of-life, terminal illnesses. I ask the witnesses to correct me if I am wrong when they next contribute.

As someone who does believe in offering a choice to people, I am struck by the question of how we can bring in this type of restrictive and safeguarded model, one that does not start off at A and then moves to B in a short space of time. I say this because, unfortunately, whether we care to admit it or not, the experience we are learning from, as recounted by contributors in previous meetings, is that assisted dying does broaden over time and becomes a normalised part of life. Perhaps this is something people may be comfortable with but it is not something that sits very comfortably with me.

I can see in certain cases where one would very compassionately see that it would be the right thing to do. I was struck, however, by one of the examples Ms Walsh gave. Even in a restrictive model, with robust safeguards in place, doctors do get it wrong. Donal was not to see Christmas or Easter, but he did see them and he had a much better experience.

Only recently, my own friend's father received a diagnosis that he would not see another Christmas and he went on to see a second. Even if a very restrictive, robust framework is put in place, how can we be 100% sure? I will ask Mr. Wall, Mr. Curran and Mr. Ahern to answer on this. How can we be 100% sure that the diagnosis will be accurate and that we are not robbing people, unintentionally, of some quality time on this earth with their loved ones?