Annastacia Palaszczuk’s allies to oppose assistant dying laws

At least three of Annastacia Palaszczuk’s factional allies will vote against a bill to legalise voluntary euthanasia, Labor’s centrepiece policy at last year’s state election.

Greenslopes MP and former nurse Joe Kelly speaks against proposed voluntary assisted dying laws in Queensland’s parliament. Picture: Dan Peled

At least three of Annastacia Palaszczuk’s factional allies will vote against a bill to legalise voluntary euthanasia, Labor’s centrepiece policy at last year’s state election.

Three MPs from the Right faction, of which Ms Palaszczuk is the most senior member, will oppose the bill when a conscience vote is taken in Queensland parliament on Thursday evening.

Joe Kelly, a nurse who represents Greenslopes on Brisbane’s southside, was the first Labor MP to speak against the laws on Wednesday which he believes “presents real conundrums for nurses”.

“It is my real professional view that we can provide dignified death when you provide good palliative care,” he said.

Assistant Minister to the Premier, Bart Mellish, will also vote no. He believes “better palliative care is what we should be focusing our efforts on”.

Logan MP Linus Power, one of the only MPs to have sat in the chamber for the entire debate, said he was concerned specialists could never accurately predict how many months terminally ill people had left to live.

The opposition of the three Labor MPs will be offset by support from LNP members, including Dale Last, Steve Minikin, Tim Nicholls, Sam O’Connor, Brent Mickelberg, Michael Hart and Rob Molhoek.

In explaining their vote, the LNP members cited their fundamental belief in the individual’s right to make decisions affecting their own lives.

In an opinion piece published in today’s Australian, Jesuit academic Father Frank Brennan raises concerns with parts of the Queensland legislation which go further than laws in other states.

Under the laws, terminal patients at faith-based facilities would still be able to end their lives if they were too sick to be moved somewhere else.

Father Brennan, a progressive Catholic who supported legalisation of same-sex marriage in 2017, writes the new provisions in the Queensland bill “will upset some nursing home residents who would prefer to be left in peace, violate the consciences of some of Queensland’s finest health practitioners, and interfere with the smooth operation of some of Queensland’s finest hospitals and aged-care facilities”.

During debate on Wednesday, Ms Palaszczuk said she supported her caucus colleagues’ right to vote against the bill and said her government had listened to concerns of faith-based organisations.

“This is not about me or about anyone else telling someone else what to do,” she said.

“Dignity is a word that I hold dear to me. There should be and there must be dignity in death.”

Ms Palaszczuk, who last year lost her grandmother and uncle, said she was phoned by her mother on Wednesday morning asking her to “please remember Nanna”.

“And I do remember her. In fact I have not brought myself to go back to her gravesite since the funeral,” she said.

“During the final time in her life she rang me and said, ‘I‘m in pain’, and I actually couldn’t go and see her because I had work … I will always regret not going and helping her during that time.”

Ms Palaszczuk said the time was right for voluntary euthanasia. “This has been a gradual coming of age for Queensland,” she said.