Barrie said it was a "highly emotionally charged situation" and she acknowledged she was "over-zealous in expressing my disappointment with the way things were progressing". Continue reading

It was a slimmer margin than the one achieved at first reading in December 2017. The vote then was 76 to 44.

While the vote appears decisive with a majority of 20, it will require a shift of only 11 votes to block it at the third and final reading.

New Zealand First has supported the Bill at first and second reading but only on the expectation that an amendment will be passed putting to a referendum at the next stage of debate.

If the referendum amendment is not agreed, senior New Zealand First MP Tracey Martin has said it would be unlikely the party would support the bill at its final reading.

Just 20 MPs had the opportunity to debate the bill. Many of them used their time in the debate to express disappointment at the Justice Select Committee process.

The Committee didn't manage to make any major change such as narrowing the bill to apply to only the terminally ill.

As it stands, the bill would allow for people in unbearable suffering, with an incurable, grievous condition or who have a terminal illness likely to end their life within six months, to ask a doctor to help end their life.

That was a reason many speakers gave for voting in favour of the second reading.

They expressed the hope that this next stage - the Committee of the whole House - would allow for changes to be made.

This has prompted a number of commentators to say that the real fight is yet to come.

Almost everyone involved agrees that it will need serious amending - including Seymour himself.

Maggie Barry, who has strongly opposed assisted dying, called the Bill the most poorly drafted she'd ever seen.

The Bill will now move to the House where more major amendments will be proposed and debated before it faces its third and final reading.

Barry is leading a group of MPs opposing the Bill, with more than a hundred proposed amendments.

If the bill is passed with New Zealand First's support, then a referendum must take place.

Click here to see party and individual votes.

Source

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• Image: wikipedia.org

Coming from the world of seasonal culling, Barry has decided the concept of voluntary euthanasia is so anathematic that she is going to start up a parliamentary encounter group on palliative care, and kill off the sensible legislation of Labour MP Maryann Street that gives the terminally ill the opportunity to end their suffering.

There can be no question that Parliament is wholly out of step with public sentiment when it comes to death. For the past two decades, public opinion polls have indicated New Zealanders clearly want the option of voluntary euthanasia should their medical prognosis be a lingering, uncomfortable and distressing death.