The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) will move to start community consultations early next year on voluntary assisted dying laws after a quarter-century ban was overturned.
The Senate passed a repeal bill to remove the embargo on Australia’s two territories legislating on euthanasia after the Northern Territory (NT) became the first jurisdiction to legalise it in 1995.
Senators cheered and hugged as the Territory Rights Bill passed on Thursday, as advocates and political representatives from the ACT and NT looked on from the public gallery.
Finance Minister and ACT Senator Katy Gallagher branded it “a really significant and historic moment.”
The ACT’s second senator, David Pocock, said the bill came off the back of years of advocacy and stoic people coming forward and telling their stories….