Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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I thank Dr. Campbell for making that last point because not every one makes the point in advance of something being legalised that it is to be expected that when something is made legal, it increases. Yet, that is almost universally the case. As I understand it, it is not that it increases while, for example, a waiting list is being dealt with but that the increases we have seen in places like the Netherlands, Canada and Oregon are there over time.

On the Netherlands, I need to clarify something I said that was not quite accurate. When it was said that the Netherlands had been at this for a long time I thought of the Flann O'Brien phrase, "When it was neither popular nor profitable". I had suggested that, in the case of the woman who was euthanised against her will, they had given her the sedative in order to prevent her from resisting. The committee found that by giving her the sedative, they took away her chance to physically protest her death, and she got a further sedative when the first one was not having sufficient effect. I did not quite accurately state what had happened there.

The subject of double effect is important and I was a bit surprised that Dr. Campbell dismissed it in the terms she did. Some of what Senator Ruane is talking about is addressable. Mr. Keyes will know that normally in criminal law what is foreseeable is intended. Double effect describes the situation where this is different.

It is not just a matter of foreseeing something you do not want to happen; it has to be a proportionate effect. Senator Ruane mentioned self-defence. If in self-defence you kill a person when a lesser step would have been sufficient, you certainly are not going to escape a legal sanction.

On the question of the Christian origin of the doctrine of double effect, Mr. Keyes will agree that there is a lot that we take from history that continues to be useful, such as equity in the area of law. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophystates many morally reflective people have been persuaded that something along the lines of double effect must be correct. It gives very practical examples, such as deciding to end the life of one person with a trolley in order to save five who would otherwise die. Maybe more controversially, it refers to the difference between terrorist bombing and tactical bombing where it is known that civilians might be affected. We need to be careful about dismissing double effect as though it were some strange hangover from the past. It continues to have real applications.

I am coming to this not just from the perspective of asking what safeguards the witnesses recommend but also from the perspective of asking whether safeguards actually work. Is there such a thing as a safeguard against people losing a sense of the value of their own lives because the State now permits them to be ended? In jurisdictions where there is a breach of safeguards put in place, is there in law a tariff similar to those for murder or manslaughter, for example?