Professor David Albert Jones:

It depends how you ask the question.

The Senator referred to people calling it "assisted dying" or "assisted suicide". An opinion poll in UK from two years ago asked people were asked what they thought "assisted dying" means. Over half of the people who answered said it is to do with withdrawal of treatment or with palliative care. There is significant confusion out there about what "assisted dying". People are accepting of it partly because they are accepting of things that are acceptable - things that are already standard. There is a portion of public opinion in favour of changing the law but I do not think that has changed. If you look, you will see that it has not changed over time. Politicians who have considered this in lots of different jurisdictions have concerns not just with what the average person thinks but also what those with most involvement in end-of-life care or disability groups think. They have been concerned more about the views of the people who are most vulnerable or the views of people who have the greatest involvement with dying, and not just with what an average voter thinks.