Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I join in welcoming our American guest from New York. We are always delighted to have our American friends over, and we have a great interest in New York. To be honest, we do not find them nearly as interesting at the moment as the people of Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina and Georgia. Many of us do not anticipate getting much sleep on the night of 5 November. We wish our guests the best of luck with the forthcoming election. May all their dreams be fulfilled, whatever they may be.

This afternoon, the Oireachtas Life and Dignity Group had the pleasure of welcoming Dr. Tom Hutchinson, an Irish doctor based for many years in Montréal, Canada, at McGill University. He is an expert in palliative care who really gave us a very illuminating talk on the business of healing as opposed to just clinical management of patients. It was a very enlightened perspective on healthcare from a very reflective practitioner, and a great Irish export in medicine. It was great to hear his wisdom. We had that talk with him in the context of reflecting on the current debates about whether this country will introduce some kind of an assisted dying regime, and what the implications of that might be for high-quality palliative care.

Around 20,000 people will take to the streets on Sunday next to participate in the Dublin City Marathon. They will be optimistic people mainly, of all ages and conditions. Yet, should any one of those runners begin to falter in the last 1,000 m or so, we do all we can to encourage them over the line. There are stories of people who sacrifice their own position in a race in order to help a struggling colleague. We celebrate those who help others to get to the finishing line. I think that can help us understand how we should approach proper care in the end-of-life situation as well. Very few people want to die. They do not want to be pulled off the track before the finishing line but good-quality palliative care support can help bring people to the finish, and that is the struggle of life. Success is in getting to the finishing line and we all want that for ourselves and others. If we were to encourage pulling people off the track in the last 1,000 m or so, then celebration of those who finish would be diminished. So what if you finish the race? Promoters of assisted dying sometimes talk of intolerable suffering, yet the palliative care people tell us that pain can be managed, and managed well.

We are fortunate to live in a period of history where so much can be done to address the fear of suffering and loneliness. By world standards, we have high-class palliative care but nationwide support remains patchy. I note and welcome the national adult palliative care strategy that has emerged in recent times.There is a promise to fund that to the tune of €6 million. We would need €20 million a year to ensure the high-quality palliative care we need into the future in order that we can address the fear that may lead people to make unfortunate decisions at the end of life. I hope that does not become the route we travel in this country. I ask for a debate on the national adult palliative care strategy to discuss how we can help people finish the race well.