Politics · Canada · 1 day ago
Former Quebec premier questions how far assisted dying has expanded
Philippe Couillard was Quebec’s premier when the province passed Canada’s first law on medical assistance in dying, or MAID, in 2014.
The law was intended for people with terminal illnesses who met specific conditions.
Two years later, Parliament passed a federal MAID law after a Supreme Court ruling found that a ban violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Since then, the rules have changed, and Quebec began allowing advance requests in 2024 for people who may later lose the ability to consent.
Couillard says he is now unsure whether he would have supported the original law, given how much MAID has expanded.
This week, the federal government said it would not extend MAID to people whose sole condition is mental illness.
Cases arguing for that expansion are before the courts.
Former Quebec premier Philippe Couillard says he is conflicted about how far medically assisted dying has expanded since Quebec passed its first law in 2014.
Couillard says he might not have voted for the law again given later expansions.
The original Quebec law set conditions for terminally ill patients to request medical assistance in dying.
Quebec later allowed advance requests, while the federal government has decided not to expand assisted dying to people whose sole condition is mental illness.
- Who
- Philippe Couillard, the former Quebec premier who oversaw passage of the law.
- What
- Couillard says he worries that medically assisted dying has expanded beyond the limits of the original law.
- When
- He discussed his concerns in an interview published October 10, 2026.
- Where
- Quebec and Canada.
- Why
- He says the original law was intended for people with terminal or pre-terminal conditions, but the practice has since expanded.
This story does not have two clearly opposing sides.
It was clearly reserved for terminal or pre-terminal conditions with a defined, unfortunate road to the end of life. And this is not the case anymore.
I'm not sure that I would have again voted for that law with the extension that we have seen in the recent years.
We see your motivation is good, but you will see, once you open the door you will not close it and it will open wider.
Quebec's National Assembly passed an assisted dying law while Couillard was premier.
The Supreme Court ruled that a prohibition on medically assisted dying ran contrary to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Parliament passed federal assisted dying legislation after the Quebec law.
The Superior Court of Quebec struck down the federal law's restriction to people whose deaths were reasonably foreseeable.
The federal government passed a subsequent law in response to the court ruling.
Quebec began allowing advance requests for assisted dying.
- Quebec law
- Passed in 2014
- Federal law
- Passed in 2016
- Quebec court ruling
- 2019
- Subsequent federal law
- Passed in 2021
- Advance requests in Quebec
- Allowed from 2024
- Former premier
- Philippe Couillard
Sources
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