Slovenia passes assisted dying law
Australia, Canada, the Netherlands and Belgium are among the countries to permit assisted dying, as well as some U.S. states. Last month, Britain's parliament voted to legalise assisted dying, although the bill must still clear the upper chamber of parliament.
Slovenia's lawmakers approved the bill with 50 votes in favour, 34 against, and three abstentions. The legislation follows a consultative referendum last year in which 55% of voters called for such a law.
Treatment options will have to be exhausted, and the right to assisted dying will not be available in the case of unbearable suffering resulting from mental illness, STA news agency reported.
A civil group that opposes the new law said on Friday it would try to gather enough public support to force a referendum on the new law.
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The Sun
7 minutes ago
- The Sun
Starmer must find REAL ways to solve migrant crisis – not pathetic sticking plaster ‘solutions' voters will see through
THE Home Secretary's plans to fast-track the asylum appeals process are, on the face of it, a welcome development. Because asylum seekers awaiting the results of appeal are entitled to state support, including both a weekly allowance and accommodation in the infamous hotels, it means any delay in processing claims is a direct cost on the taxpayer. 4 Yet there are good reasons to doubt that it will provide anything more than a short-term palliative to a chronic, structural problem with the asylum regime – and perhaps not even that. One of the biggest challenges facing the Home Office has long been deporting people whose claims are rejected. Even if their country of origin is deemed 'predominantly safe', as Yvette Cooper put it, some governments make it very difficult to return their citizens. In other cases, deportation is made extremely difficult because asylum seekers often destroy their passports. Rejected asylum seekers have to be housed and supported by the state, just like those awaiting appeal. This creates a very obvious incentive for politicians to turn any fast-track scheme into a rubber-stamping exercise, 'clearing the backlog' by waving people into the country. It wouldn't be the first time politicians and campaigners have resorted to interpreting a problem over-literally in order to pretend to have solved it. Just a few months ago, the Labour Government proposed to fix the problem of putting asylum seekers up in hotels . . . by having the Home Office buy up private rented housing instead. Then there are those who suggest 'safe and legal routes' as a solution to Channel crossings — a proposal that hinges on the idea that the problem is people coming here in boats rather than their coming at all. If that were the case, we could simply stop searching the lorries at the Channel Tunnel! Moment bus full of asylum seekers are 'snuck into' 4-star London hotel under cover of darkness despite UK-wide protests I don't want to sound like a partisan Tory here. The previous government's efforts to tackle the crisis were in much the same spirit. Whatever the merits of the Rwanda scheme, it was never going to accommodate more than a small fraction of the volume of illegal arrivals (although it nonetheless did seem to have some impact on the number of people trying to cross). Left or Right, when it comes to illegal immigration the motto seems to be: 'look busy'. Ministers keep tinkering around the edges of the problem, but nobody seems willing to confront the deep, structural pull factors which make Britain such an attractive target for migrants. Some of these, such as our language being so widely spoken, cannot be helped. But others, especially our non-contributory welfare system and the ease with which people can work in the black economy, could be tackled. That, however, would require fundamental and far-reaching reform, not least of the welfare state. We could also legislate to make deportations easier. The Home Secretary has pledged to tighten the rules around 'exceptional circumstances', which is a good start. TIED IN KNOTS But the Government could go a lot further, in particular on restricting appeals under Article 8 of the ECHR — the ' right to family life ' — which underpins many of the most egregious decisions made by asylum tribunals. For all the debate around whether or not the UK should quit the European Convention on Human Rights, we don't actually need to. Under the British constitution, the ECHR only applies if given effect by domestic law, and Parliament can legislate as it pleases. Labour should know this well: it was none other than Tony Blair who defied Strasbourg to refuse prisoners the vote. Sir Keir Starmer is unlikely to be enthusiastic about such measures. Lord Hermer, his friend and hand-picked Attorney General, has written to ministers rejecting the very idea that Parliament could legislate in any way that breached international law. But the Prime Minister should learn from the fate of his predecessor. 4 Like Starmer, Rishi Sunak promised the nation he would stop the crossings. He and his team were also — again like Starmer — unwilling to change or challenge any of Britain's existing legal or treaty commitments. The result was that they tied themselves in knots trying to make the Rwanda scheme compliant with the ECHR, only to fail — and paid a historically heavy price at the ballot box the following year. Labour MPs are already worried the same fate may befall them. They are right to worry: while the Government's majority is huge, this is actually the most marginal parliament since 1945 in terms of seat majorities. It would not take a big shift in public opinion to unseat dozens, or even hundreds, of Labour MPs at the next election. 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Daily Mail
7 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Bosses urge Chancellor to save a million kids from the scrapheap
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BreakingNews.ie
37 minutes ago
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'The working class must take back what is ours': Imagining James Connolly's Ireland
James Connolly is well-known for being a socialist and revolutionary leader in the fight for Irish independence, as well as a champion for the working class. "A revolution will only be achieved when the ordinary people of the world, us, the working class, get up off our knees and take back what is rightfully ours," is one of his famous quotes. Advertisement According to Dictionary of Irish Biography, Connolly arrived at a view that the future for socialism and the working class in Ireland lay in an independent republic rather than in continued union with Britain or in a federal arrangement involving home rule. This was quickly reflected in his and his colleagues' decision to disband the Dublin Socialist Club and to establish in its place the Irish Socialist Republican Party (ISRP). His manifesto for the new party was radical and ahead of its time, calling for free education and child health care, nationalisation of transport and banking, and a commitment to the further extension of public ownership. Connolly spent seven years (1903-1910) in the United States and, during that time, was instrumental in the development of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) militant labour organisation. Advertisement The group promoted the ideology of revolutionary syndicalism or industrial unionism, recruiting among the huge mass of unskilled and general labour in the USA. Connolly recruited Irish and Italian workers in New York for the IWW. Promoting socialism in Ireland The Dictionary of Irish Biography said Connolly's commitment to promoting socialism among the Irish was evident in his foundation of the Irish Socialist Federation in 1907. It was through its agency that he began to re-establish links with socialists in Ireland, notably with his former ISRP colleague, William O'Brien. By 1908, both he and O'Brien's Dublin socialists were considering the possibility of his coming back to be organiser for the newly emerging Socialist Party of Ireland (SPI). Advertisement The period after his return from the US saw much of the most significant theoretical and practical work of his life. In 1910, he published the important tract Labour, nationality and religion, written to rebut the attacks of the Jesuit Father Kane on socialism and to contest the notion that catholicism and socialism were irreconcilable. In the same year he also brought to publication his most famous work, Labour in Irish History. This was the first substantial exposition of a Marxist interpretation of Irish history. Highly original in some if its findings, the Dictionary of Irish Biography said it argued for the continuity of a radical tradition in Ireland, and sought to debunk nationalist myths about Ireland's past and to expose the inadequacies of middle-class Irish nationalism in providing a solution for Ireland's ills. Advertisement Easter Rising: Connolly the revolutionary During a period of time spent in Belfast, Connolly hoped to inspire union growth and socialist progress, but this agenda was quickly overtaken by the events of the lockout and general strike in Dublin from August 1913. He was summoned to Dublin to assist Larkin in the leadership of this conflict, and, when the struggle was lost and Larkin left for America in 1914, Connolly took over as acting general secretary of the defeated Transport Union. To the disastrous defeat of the locked out and striking workers was now added the calamitous outbreak of world war. This drove Connolly into an advanced nationalist position and, though he never abandoned his socialist commitment, the social revolution took a back seat. The Dictionary of Irish Biography said the growing militancy of Ulster unionist opposition to home rule, the British government's postponement of plans for home rule in the face of unionist opposition, the growing prospect of the partition of Ireland, the outbreak of world war, and the consequent collapse of international socialism, all contributed to his adopting an extreme nationalist stance. Advertisement As he wrote in Forward in March 1914: "The proposal of the Government to consent to the partition of Ireland . . . should be resisted with armed force if necessary." Connolly said that the "carnival of slaughter" that was the world war drove him to incite "war against war", and to make tentative overtures to the revolutionary IRB. By late 1915, his increasing militancy at a time when the IRB had decided on insurrection caused them in turn to approach him; by late January they and he had agreed on a joint uprising. The Transport Union headquarters at Liberty Hall became the headquarters of the Irish Citizen Army as he prepared it for revolt. The Dictionary of Irish Biography pointed out that it was ironic that Connolly, who had always argued that political freedom without socialism was useless, now joined forces with militant nationalists in an insurrection that had nothing to do directly with socialism. It seems that Connolly believed national freedom for Ireland in the circumstances was a necessity before socialism could advance. In the event, he led his small band of about 200 Citizen Army comrades into the Easter Rising of 1916. His Citizen Army joined forces with the Volunteers, as the only army he acknowledged in 1916 was that of 'the Irish Republic'. As commandant general of the Republic's forces in Dublin, he fought side by side with Patrick Pearse in the General Post Office (GPO), until surrendering on April 29th. Connolly was badly injured in the foot, and was court-martialled along with 170 others. He was one of 90 to be sentenced to death, and was the last one of the 15 to be executed by firing squad. He was shot dead, seated on a wooden box, in Kilmainham Gaol on May 12th, 1916. Connolly was buried in the cemetery within Arbour Hill military barracks, and his wife and six of his children survived him. James Connolly's vision for Ireland would make the country a very different place to live in today. While all the participants in the Easter Rising shared the goal of Irish independence, each had their own ideas about what kind of Ireland should emerge afterward. If he had survived and lived beyond 1916, possibly becoming Taoiseach, it is fair to say Connolly's Ireland would be more socialist, secular, and worker-led in structure. He had envisioned a workers' republic where industry and land were publicly owned and democratically managed, and was not just simply fighting for Irish independence, but for the Irish working class.
