Minor parties to kill off euthanasia reform in a hung parliament

One Nation and Katter’s Australian Party will try to slam the brakes on euthanasia reform if the state slides into minority government.

KAP leader Robbie Katter said he was against euthanasia law reform and the party would not support it being prioritised after the election. Picture: Matt Taylor

Potential balance of power players in Queensland, One Nation and Katter’s Australian Party will try to slam the brakes on euthanasia reform if the state slides into minority government after the October 31 general election.

Both say the push for Queensland to become the third state to legalise voluntary assisted dying for the terminally ill is a lower order concern compared with ­containing COVID-19 and firing up the economy.

Annastacia Palaszczuk’s Labor government has asked the Queensland Law Reform Commission to prepare draft VAD legislation, using the process that decriminalised abortion in 2018.

But a hung parliament looms after the state election, with Newspoll last Friday putting the Liberal National Party a nose ahead of Labor by 51 to 49 on a two-party preferred basis in a race that remains too tight to call.

Senator Pauline Hanson and her chief of staff James Ashby at the Commonwealth Parliamentary Offices in Brisbane. Photographer: Liam Kidston

The LNP will struggle to win the nine additional seats to form majority government, while Labor has limited opportunity to grow its two-seat buffer in the 93-seat state parliament.

KAP leader Robbie Katter said he was against euthanasia law reform and the party would not support it being prioritised after the election. KAP holds three state seats and is eyeing further gains in north Queensland.

“Labor and Liberal love throwing in these social issues to try to make them a priority above anything else,” he told The Australian.

“I would certainly share the view that there are other priorities, and personally I am strongly opposed to touching those laws, and so are the other members of KAP.

“We would need a lot of convincing to move from that.”

Pauline Hanson’s righthand man, James Ashby, said One ­Nation would not support a VAD law being put on the legislative agenda. The party won only one state seat three years ago but is hopeful a likely 20 per cent-plus vote in some coastal regions north of Brisbane will reap a return on October 31.

“It’s not a priority so therefore we will not be suggesting that it be brought on in the new parliament,” Mr Ashby said.

“No way at all. It is the last thing on our minds and more than likely the last thing on the minds of Queenslanders. I think we are in for serious economic consequences come Christmas, and the new year is going to be diabolical.”

An all-party parliamentary committee in March backed a VAD law by a majority finding to make Queensland the third state after Victoria and Western Australia to enshrine the right to die. LNP members had dissented.

The committee referred to the state Law Reform Commission a model bill that was framed by Queensland University of Technology law professors Ben White and Lindy Willmott, both former members of the commission. If the Labor government under Ms Palaszczuk is returned for a third term, it will put the legislation to a conscience vote of parliament.

Opposition leader Deborah Frecklington has said that LNP MPs would be free to vote their conscience, but it is not clear whether she would pursue VAD reform in office should she win power. LNP policy remains opposed to voluntary euthanasia.