Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

As regards the slippery slope, I would refer the Deputy back to Professor Theo Boer. I note my friend here from the humanist association.

Even in Oregon today certainly the numbers have expanded, which is suggestive of a slippery slope in terms of attitude and a rise in the number of people who feel they are a burden. I believe there was a rise of 53% in the past year in Oregon where it is an issue of concern that they feel a burden. That is a dramatic change. There have been dramatic changes in the law in the Netherlands where they are contemplating legalising euthanasia on the grounds of simply old age, and on the basis that from the age of 73 there is a completion of life. There is also Canada and the runaway train there. I am afraid it is hard to find the slope that is not slippery if we look across the world, even in the conservative regimes. My friend Gino was anxious to mention New Zealand, but it has only been there a wet week and yet they are trumpeting how successful it is. It is far too early to say, as the fellow said when asked what he thought of the French Revolution 200 years on. It is certainly too early to say in these countries. We must look at the countries where it has been long established, and what we see, as Professor Theo Boer has told us, is a shaking of social attitudes where people think about themselves and their illness in a new way. This is the idea that many experts have been trying to get across. We cannot just talk about one person's autonomy to the exclusion of everybody else's needs. Autonomy is worked out with the eye on other people's vulnerability as well. Other people are made vulnerable when it becomes a choice for some to have their lives ended. This is the point that many experts have been trying to emphasise over and over again.

Can I say how impressed I am by our Muslim friends and the wisdom that came from them this evening just in the way they listed the issues and particularly the risk of potential of neglect of long-term care, people feeling the pressure of being a burden or being perceived as such, and people choosing death without addressing the underlying causes. They have brought out for us how voices of faith can bring a light to these issues that can illuminate for other people too. It is not that what they say can only be understood through the lens of faith; it is precisely the opposite. It is through a vision of life - a philosophy, really - that they bring to the table. This is why I cannot quite understand why my friends Gino and Mary Seery Kearney seem to feel that faith has to be sanitised or put into some kind of hermetically sealed container. Surely everybody brings a background to their understanding of these issues, whether it is our personal experience of being loved or not loved, whether it is our political agenda, or whether it is our non-belief in a higher power. There is no neutrality here. There are only voices seeking to persuade each other. It is quite possible that people of faith also have something to say that can be grasped by other people. If he thinks about it, Gino agrees with that. If people like Fr. Peter McVerry or Sr. Stanislaus say life is sacred and to remember we are all God's children, then one is going to be attracted by that message. It may not be your way of saying it but it concretises the sense that there is something more to a human being than just matter.

I will say one word of caution to my Muslim friends and I hope they do not think I am being insulting or mocking. They referred to pain control in palliative care and that Islamic rulings advocate endurance for non-terminal patients experiencing severe pain. This would not be good for sales of Lemsip, and as a frequent suffer from man flu, I would be inclined to discourage that particular attitude to non-severe pain.

On the issues, I want to ask our voices of faith here, and I do not really mind who picks up on this, if they believe there is a prejudice against the faith perspective offering an analysis on this that might be taken up by people of all faiths and none? Is there a kind of prejudice that perhaps is not there towards other people's background baggage? Do the witnesses believe that maybe this is part of our own particular history in Ireland? Is this something we have to get over? Are we really saying that only atheistic or agnostic philosophers can bring objectivity or wisdom to this debate? Is it not also sub-rational to say, if the majority of people are for this, then why are you on the wrong side of history? Again, to my friend Gino I would say if the opinion polls show, and they seem to, that the majority of people think we have now taken enough immigrants into Ireland, does he accept that this-----