ARPA Canada is launching a campaign for better reporting and regulations around doctor-assisted suicide. Bill C-14, which legalized the practice last year, envisioned that MAiD would include some regulation. But the way the bill is worded is a bit unusual. It says the Health Minister “must make regulations that he or she considers necessary” on the issue.

Those rules are supposed to take effect by June, but ARPA lawyer John Sikkema says the notion that the minister can decide whether or not the regulations are “considered necessary” is a very unusual proviso in the law. “I did some research just to look for that phrasing – or something close to that phrasing – in other statutes. You don’t find it.” Now, Sikkema says, we’ll have to wait until June to see if the Minister does “consider it necessary”.

Sikkema says ARPA is launching an EasyMail campaign on the issue. He says you’re being asked to remind MPs that the Supreme Court called for the regulations when it legalized assisted suicide. You can read more of ARPA’s analysis and access the EasyMail campaign here.