This article was published by Vivre Dans La Dignité on March 12, 2025.
Montreal, March 12, 2025 – On March 10 and 11 in Geneva (Switzerland), the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities examined the report submitted by Canada under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
As this review is flying under the media radar due to current events, the Living with Dignity citizen network would like to highlight some of the interventions of the United Nations experts addressing medical assistance in dying as well as recommendations from Canadian groups participating in the study.
"A False Choice"
Ms. Kayess went so far as to add during the discussions “Do you not see this as a step back into state-sanctioned eugenics programmes”?
As is too often the case during these reviews, the answers of the Canadian delegation were often prepared in advance and did not appear to satisfy the experts. « The dialogue would have been more fruitful if there was less reliance on prepared statements which frequently did not answer the Committee’s questions. » according to Mr. Markus Schefer, committee expert and taskforce member, who, at the start of the second day, had to remind the delegation to avoid “canned answers”.
Recommendations from Canadian groups
Living in Dignity supports these recommendations made by more than 50 organizations (several of which were in Geneva) in the Civil Society Parallel Report for Canada:
● Repeal Track Two MAiD;
● Repeal the legal provisions which will make Track Two MAiD available to people with a mental illness as their sole underlying medical condition in March 2027.
As Inclusion Canada pointed out in a press release issued on Monday, several organizations defending the rights of persons with disabilities, as well as individuals, have challenged Canada’s expanded MAiD laws by launching a legal Charter challenge in the Ontario Superior Court.
Living with Dignity would also like to highlight this recommendation from the Canadian Human Rights Commission:
“Recommendation #3: That before taking further action on its expansion, Canada conduct a critical and thorough examination of what has happened since the coming into force of MAiD legislation, including by collecting the evidence and testimony necessary so that there is a clear understanding of who is accessing MAiD and why, and by ensuring that the experiences and concerns of those who are most marginalized are listened to, valued and addressed.”
The recommendations of several other groups deserve your attention, including those of the Assembly of First Nations, the Environmental Health Associations of Canada and Québec and the Feminist Alliance for International Action.
All these recommendations are available in the reports posted on this page, as are those of the Canadian delegation, which we invite you to read and analyze. The Parallel Report of Civil Society for Canada can be found under the name of one of the signatories, ARCH Disability Law Centre.
Next step? The UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities will publish its concluding observations on March 21 (end of its current session).
To review all of the Committee’s exchanges with the Canadian delegation this week (two three-hour sessions):
- March 10, https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1n/k1n09gnpy1 (quotes from Ms. Kayess, Vice-Chairperson of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, are at 02:19:04 and 02:25:04);
- March 11, https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k1j/k1jvnn43r1.
Jasmin Lemieux-Lefebvre
Coordinator
Living with Dignity citizen network
www.vivredignite.org/en
info@vivredignite.org
438-931-1233
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