End of life, Zaia: ‘Forward in Parliament or government does not challenge regional laws’

Milan, 16 February (LaPresse) – “This country must overcome a great hypocrisy: citizens cannot be led to believe that end-of-life issues do not exist. It does exist, by virtue of the 2019 ruling of the Constitutional Court. I say this especially to those who want to sweep the issue under the carpet, making people believe that there are irresponsible people, like me, who, with a sort of unjustifiable blasphemy, cherish this idea of assisted suicide.” So said the former governor of Veneto, Luca Zaia, in an interview with La Stampa. I see that there are those in Parliament who are perplexed by the idea of passing a law because they fear it may push the most fragile terminally ill patients to assisted suicide: but it is precisely this category of people who should be calling for rules to be put in place, rather than living in the hypocrisy of leaving end-of-life decisions to a ruling by the Constitutional Court. Those who are against it should simply have the courage to call for a law against end-of-life decisions. But no one is saying anything,‘ Zaia points out, adding that ’the regions are only trying to fill two gaps that the Constitutional Court could not intervene in.‘ According to Zaia, the Meloni government is challenging regional laws before the Constitutional Court ’because it claims there is a conflict of jurisdiction, but in the meantime, the Chambers remain immobile, deaf to the requests that have come three times from the Constitutional Court. It’s a dog chasing its tail’. Zaia hopes “that there will be a parliamentary initiative, but at this point there are two options: either the government stops challenging regional laws, or, if it does challenge them, it must push the measure forward in Parliament”.