The Liberals are planning to table legislation to cancel the planned expansion of medical assistance in dying for people whose sole underlying condition is a mental illness, Justice Minister Sean Fraser announced Wednesday.

The decision is a direct recommendation from a report tabled in the spring by a special parliamentary committee tasked with examining the MAiD framework.

Fraser told reporters outside West Block that legislation wasn’t coming this week, but he wanted to put the government’s position on the record as MPs prepare to vote on a Conservative private member’s bill on Wednesday.

“While there is not a perfect consensus on this issue, we believe this is the correct approach at this particular time,” he said, citing concerns such as the lack of access to mental health supports in some communities.

Tamara Jensen’s bill would have removed mental illness alone as a condition for accessing MAiD. Fraser said the government opposes it because its use of the term mental disorders is overly broad and could remove MAiD access from those who have serious neurological diseases.

While cabinet ministers are expected to follow the government’s direction, as a private member’s bill, it’s a free vote for Liberal backbenchers.

Fraser said the government’s bill would also require health practitioners to respect advance directives in provinces where permitted. Under that framework, patients can provide advance consent for MAiD before their illness takes hold. It’s to be used in cases where patients may lose mental faculties to offer consent.

Advanced directives are not mentioned in Jensen’s bill.

READ MORE: On heels of latest report, advocacy group for disabled people wants Ottawa to scrap MAiD Track 2

A Supreme Court ruling in 2015 struck down Canada’s criminalization of euthanasia and gave Parliament a deadline to pass legislation granting access to MAiD.

That first law restricted MAiD to people whose deaths were reasonably foreseeable. The Quebec Superior Court in 2019 stuck down the law as overly restrictive, prompting Ottawa to expand access to those with a grievous and irremediable medical condition.

Under the current eligibility rules, a patient requesting MAiD must have a serious illness, be in an advanced, irreversible state of decline, experience unbearable physical or mental suffering, and have exhausted all treatment options.

The 2021 law that created the new requirements also provided a pathway for people to request MAiD whose only underlying condition was a mental illness. This was originally set to go into effect in 2023, but the government intervened twice to delay the introduction to 2027.

Advocacy group Dying with Dignity is already challenging the government’s restriction of MAiD access in the courts.

Fraser acknowledged the government may lose that case, but said that couldn’t be an excuse for failing to act.

“There was a significant canvassing of opinions… and we felt confident that we were in a position to make a decision without simply kicking the can down the road.”

There is no timeline for when the bill will be introduced. Fraser said it would happen later this fall sitting.

More to come…