The controversial bill creating a right to euthanasia for people suffering from an incurable pathology, which is to be debated this Thursday in the National Assembly, was already the subject of around 2,000 amendments this Friday evening, a desire "
Parliamentary obstruction
" according to its author.
Read also: The deputies take a step towards the law on euthanasia
The deadline for tabling amendments to this text is scheduled for late Saturday afternoon.
Such a number of amendments should make it impossible to examine the text establishing a "
right to a free and chosen end of life
" by MP Olivier Falorni (Liberties and Territories group), provided for within the framework of the parliamentary niche attributed to this group. .
"
A quartet of deputies claim by parliamentary obstruction to prevent the Assembly from debating on a major social issue
", denounced to AFP Mr. Falorni, whose text was adopted Wednesday evening in committee.
"
It is parliamentary democracy that is called into question
", he lambasted, targeting "
a handful of LR deputies
" who have multiplied the "
copy and paste
"
amendments
.
"
This will scandalize millions of French people who hope that this law is finally voted
".
In the Social Affairs Committee, the bill had only been the subject of 262 amendments.
"Existential questions"
The text of the deputy for Charente-Maritime wants to provide a new response to the painful and sensitive debate on the end of life and euthanasia, five years after the Claeys-Leonetti law, which authorizes deep and continuous sedation.
In committee, Mr Falorni, a former socialist, admitted that his text addressed "
existential questions
".
Read also: Are 96% of French people really in favor of euthanasia?
Opening a right to "
the ultimate freedom
" to decide on a medically assisted death would make it possible to respond to a "
hypocrisy
": letting people go into "
exile
" in Belgium or Switzerland to have recourse, and turning a blind eye to the “
2000 to 4000
” clandestine euthanasia practiced each year in France “
sometimes without the knowledge of relatives
” of patients, according to him.
The subject divides all the parliamentary groups and arouses the embarrassment of the government but several figures of the majority have given their support to the proposal of Mr. Falorni, including the president of the commission of Laws Yaël Braun-Pivet.
Some opponents believe that such a subject cannot be debated in the reduced time of a parliamentary niche when others are radically hostile to the measure for philosophical and religious principles.