Live, end of life: the National Assembly's vote on the proposed law on palliative care is about to begin

The government question session has ended. Members of Parliament are scheduled to meet again at 4:30 p.m. to vote on the bill on palliative and supportive care, which is expected to be approved unanimously.

The text provides for an enforceable right to palliative care and the creation of "support and palliative care homes" offering an alternative to hospital. These accommodations will offer specialized care for "end-of-life individuals whose medical condition has stabilized" and who cannot or do not wish to remain at home.

The bill also provides for a "personalized support plan" to be offered to patients suffering from a serious illness or those at the beginning of a loss of autonomy related to aging, in particular. A multi-year palliative care program will have to determine, before the end of 2025 and then every five years, the development trajectory of palliative care provision.

While some critics of active medical assistance in dying invoke the Hippocratic Oath, a group of healthcare workers argued, in a column published in March 2024 in Le Monde , that respecting the patient's wishes – including their desire to die – is just as essential in order to remain faithful to their spirit.

The formal vote on the bill on palliative and supportive care is scheduled to take place after questions to the government, which are currently underway and will likely be followed by a suspension of the session for a few minutes. The vote on the bill on end-of-life care will then follow.

Around twenty departments do not have services that provide palliative care for terminally ill patients in full-time hospitalization, with a staff of specialized caregivers. The government has made this figure a key indicator, promising to change it by developing palliative care throughout the country, alongside its reform of assisted dying . It is also a way of sending a message: no one will resort to assisted dying due to a lack of access to this care.

Doctors testify to other organizations deployed to support their patients at the end of life, with difficulties that remain for complex situations, on the medical, social and psychological level.

At La Timone, doctors and patients discuss the difficulty of putting death into words as it approaches. A report from these caregivers who assist hospital departments in caring for patients at the end of their lives.

On both the left and the right, parliamentarians, who remain in the minority, are raising voices that dissent from those of their political party on the proposed law put to the vote on Tuesday.

Julien MUGUET/Hans Lucas

They will be going against the grain. On Tuesday, May 27, during the formal vote in the National Assembly on the bill creating a right to assisted dying, a few dozen deputies are expected to take a position that runs counter to the majority of members of their political group. Whether they sit on the far right, the left, the center, or the Macronist benches, these minority members sometimes give similar explanations for their vote.

Thank you for your many insightful questions. This livestream continues.

The French population is very strongly in favor of a law on assisted dying. According to an IFOP survey from May 2024, "more than nine out of ten French people (92%) say they are in favor of euthanasia when the patient, suffering from an unbearable and incurable illness, requests it." This near unanimity is shared among the French, regardless of their political orientation, the institute specifies.

According to the same study, 74% of doctors want medically assisted death legalized. The bill's advocates are hoping that popular opinion will put a little pressure on senators, who are less supportive of the bill a priori.

Indeed, religious leaders in France (representing the Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Jewish, Protestant and Buddhist communities) have all called for the text to be rejected, which, according to them, presents "the dangers of an anthropological rupture" .

However, it would be wrong to say that the votes of the deputies against the law will be dictated only by their faith. "I have none and it is not membership in a religion or a Church that directs my vote." Paul Christophle, a member of the left wing of the Socialist Party and member of the Drôme department, told Le Monde . He is expected to vote against the bill on assisted dying for fear that people will want to resort to it, not because they are suffering, but because they refuse "to lose their autonomy."

One of the five cumulative criteria for eligibility for this assistance in dying is very clear: the patient must be "able to express their wishes freely and in an informed manner." Thus, if their discernment is " seriously impaired," they will not be able to benefit from this right. It is therefore the patient, and only the patient, who can request this assistance in dying.

Emmanuel Macron is asking the same question! However, several constitutional obstacles could stand in the way of holding a referendum on the subject. Indeed, the Constitution provides that a referendum can concern a bill, not a proposed law. Furthermore, assisted dying would not be among the topics eligible for a referendum, according to Article 11.

My colleague Béatrice Jérôme sums it all up for you here:

To begin, MPs must vote today on the two bills on palliative care and the right to assisted dying. If adopted, both texts will be sent to the Senate for consideration. Senate President Gérard Larcher (Yvelines, Les Républicains) stated on France Inter on May 22 that they would be discussed at the Luxembourg Palace "in the fall."

It's a safe bet that the Senate, with its right-wing majority, will make a number of changes to the text. As is the customary parliamentary cycle, it will return to the National Assembly for a second reading, then to the Senate...

If the two chambers fail to reach an agreement, the government can convene a joint committee, where seven deputies and seven senators will be responsible for reaching a compromise text.

Another solution: a referendum. President Emmanuel Macron raised this possibility during his speech on TF1 on May 13th " in the event of a deadlock" in Parliament. But the constitutionality of such an initiative clearly raises questions.

Indeed, anti-disability activists recently called on left-wing elected officials, in particular, not to vote for the law. On this subject, I invite you to read the article by my colleague Anne-Aël Durand, a specialist in these topics:

The MP behind this bill is Olivier Falorni (Charente-Maritime, Socialist Party), from the Les Démocrates group. The MP has long championed assisted dying, having already challenged Marisol Touraine, then Minister of Health, on this issue in 2013.

He then submitted a first bill which was defended during a parliamentary niche of the Liberties and Territories group in 2021, which faced obstruction from the right.

There was, however, a bill on supporting the sick and the end of life submitted by Gabriel Attal's government in April 2024. Olivier Falorni was already the rapporteur, but the text was unable to be finalized due to the dissolution. This time, the Democratic MP hopes it will be the right one!