Friday, 23 September 2016
Submission to Health Select Committee Inquiry
Maxim Institute has today given an oral submission to the Health Select Committee’s inquiry into suicide in New Zealand,
stating: “Legalisation of assisted suicide or euthanasia in New Zealand would be bad public policy, and it would be bad
law."
Presenting alongside Maxim Institute CEO Alex Penk, Research Fellow Dr Jane Silloway Smith told the members of the
Select Committee, “the extensive research we have done has shown us that there is no safe way to legalise euthanasia or
assisted suicide. It will end up affecting people who you didn’t mean it to affect. And when we talk about ‘affects’ or
‘risks’ or ‘drawbacks’ or ‘failure of safeguards,’ what we’re actually talking about is wrongful deaths.”
Alex Penk said, “Legalisation of assisted suicide sends a message that some lives are not as valuable or not as worthy
of the protection of law as others. We have to think not just about who supposedly would benefit from a law change, but
who would wear the negative effects as well.”
ends