Before the NSW Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2022 passed, conservatives had sought an amendment to allow residential aged care facilities to block eligible terminally ill residents from accessing Voluntary Assisted Dying (VAD).
The amendment was voted down because there are protections for individuals via Conscientious Objection clauses and aged care facilities are not responsible for VAD. That process is managed via the NSW Health VAD Care Navigator Service.
The VAD law passed in May 2022 and took effect in November 2023.
However, a report, released in September, shows that aged care facilities have continued to ignore the wishes of its residents on VAD.
The Voluntary Assisted Dying in Residential Aged Care Homes Report by Go Gentle Australia and the Older Persons Advocacy Network found 85% of residential aged care facilities did not support VAD or provide any information to residents.
The religious-based aged care sector has decided to again seek to legalise the institutional denial of medical care.
Susan Carter, Liberal member of the Legislative Council, introduced the Voluntary Assisted Dying Amendment (Residential Facilities) Bill 2025 on October 15. If passed, it would give aged care providers the right to block VAD practitioners from attending residents and force VAD-participating residents to transfer to another facility.
The bill is co-sponsored by 12 Liberal MPs, 2 Shooters, Fishers and Farmer’s MPs and Independent MP Mark Latham (formerly Labor, then Pauline Hanson One Nation).
Criticism of the bill has come from many quarters, including Dying With Dignity NSW and senior legal, medical and seniors right groups.
Go Gentle Australia said the bill is unconstitutional, as it contravenes the new Commonwealth Aged Care Act.
The timing is also problematic as it pre-empts and undermines the statutory review of the NSW VAD Act due to start in December.
NSW Greens MP and health spokesperson Dr Amanda Cohn told Green Left on November 5 there had been no prior consultation, saying it is “really important to have that review process with full consultation with all the relevant stakeholders to work out if any tweaks are required.
“[Carter’s bill] hasn’t gone through that kind of process … where all of the relevant people and all of the relevant stakeholders have their say on it,” Cohn said. “It’s caught a lot of people by surprise, who were expecting to be part of this statewide conversation through the proper process next month.”
Cohn agrees with advocates’ claims that Carter’s justification for the bill underplays its cruel reality. “This idea that it’s just aligning the legislation so that residential aged care facilities are treating it the same as hospitals, I think, really underplays the seriousness of what’s proposed.”
She took aim at Carter telling parliament that VAD candidates can be “simply transferred” to another institution, saying she had been contacted by “thousands of people concerned about this”.
“I heard from one individual who needs to be moved using a hoist system so there’s a real complexity and cruelty here. The voluntary assisted dying process isn’t just one appointment either … assessments and consent can take up to seven appointments.
“We’re talking about taking someone, right at the end of their life, out of their own home, either to die in hospital, which is something that they don’t want or, in some cases, actually outside of the town that they live in altogether.”
Dr John Ward, geriatrician and 2024 NSW Australia Day Senior of the Year, agrees. “In NSW, [VAD] has been a very good process, very well organised and uniformly been a successful way to end life for people who are suffering,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald on November 3.
“To propose moving them is cruel beyond belief, a denial of human rights and would be in breach of the new aged care act.”
Residential aged care in many regional areas is run by a faith-based provider. Cohn said about 20 NSW towns only have one provider. “This cruelty of taking someone away from their family and their community at the end of their life … totally goes against the principles of what the voluntary assisted dying laws sought to give people in terms of autonomy and dignity at the end of their lives.”
Despite VAD now being a matter of public health policy, if Carter’s bill is not withdrawn, MPs will be given a conscience vote.
Labor MP Rose Jackson said she and health minister Ryan Park will vote against the bill on advice from NSW Health. The Nationals are yet to indicate a position.
The bill is expected to be debated on November 12.