The Candice Malcolm Show - “I’d probably be dead right now”— MP sounds alarm on Canada’s suicide agenda

00:00:00.000 I'm Candice Malcolm and this is the Candice Malcolm Show. Thank you so much for joining

00:00:07.760 us today. We are going to cover a very sensitive, very dark topic today. And I want to just

00:00:14.900 start by talking about the rise of euthanasia in Canada. This is from a Cardis report. Cardis

00:00:21.260 is a wonderful organization, does research into this kind of thing. So here is what they

00:00:25.880 write. From exceptional to routine, MAID in Canada is the world's fastest growing assisted

00:00:32.000 dying program. Here are some of the key points. The number of Canadians dying prematurely by

00:00:37.260 what we call medical assistance in dying. We're using euphemism MAID to make it just seem like

00:00:42.620 a normal procedure or another bureaucratic acronym from the government. No, we're talking about

00:00:48.460 dying. We're talking about people being killed by medical practitioners and using the

00:00:55.680 government to help them commit suicide. Well, this assisted dying has risen 13-fold since

00:01:01.600 its legalization in 2016. The number of people dying in this way was 1,018. In 2022, the last

00:01:08.780 year that we have data available, it is 13,241. This makes MAID in Canada the world's fastest

00:01:17.020 growing assisted dying program. This is a serious concern, people, because this is not normal,

00:01:24.980 right? Look at the assisted deaths as a percentage of total deaths in other countries around the world.

00:01:30.900 You can see Canada is that red line. We just introduced this program in 2016, and it goes

00:01:36.640 straight up. So other countries, European countries have been doing this sort of thing for a generation

00:01:42.680 now, and their levels are still growing in a concerning, alarming way, but nothing like the growth

00:01:48.540 in Canada. And the things that the government, the liberal government is now applying this program

00:01:54.260 to are concerning to all. We saw a proposal that it gets applied to minors, and now we have one that

00:02:01.820 it would be applied to people with mental illness. Well, that is why I'm pleased to announce and to 0.96

00:02:08.100 report that the Conservative Party is pushing back. A Conservative MP has introduced a private

00:02:14.460 member's bill to ban medical assistance in dying. I prefer to just call it by what it is, assisted

00:02:19.660 suicide for mental illness. So back in May, Tamara Jensen, who is a Conservative member of Parliament for

00:02:26.260 Cloverdale-Langley, tabled Bill C-218, a private member's bill that seeks to amend the criminal code to

00:02:31.640 explicitly exclude mental disorders from being considered a grievous and immutable medical condition

00:02:38.900 for the purposes of MAID eligibility. If the bill passes, individuals would qualify for assisted death

00:02:44.680 on the basis of mental illness alone. So that private member's bill was introduced. And I'm happy to

00:02:52.920 announce that Conservative MP Andrew Lawton has also joined this campaign. Of course, Andrew is a former

00:03:00.120 journalist here at True North, and he was a host of the Andrew Lawton Show before becoming a member of

00:03:06.780 Parliament. He is now representing the writing of Elgin St. Thomas, London South. And I'm pleased to

00:03:11.360 welcome Andrew to the show. Andrew, thank you so much for joining the show. Great to see you.

00:03:16.320 Always good to be with you, Candice. Thanks for having me.

00:03:18.840 Well, tell us a little bit about this bill and why you've chosen to get alongside and working on this

00:03:24.860 one. Absolutely. So Bill C-218, or as we've named the Right to Recover Act, is there to ensure that

00:03:32.380 people who have a mental illness are able to be treated and supported and given hope instead of

00:03:39.500 given death by the health care system? Just a bit of background here, if I may, Candice. The

00:03:45.320 expansion of MAID to people with mental illness was never supposed to happen. It was never demanded

00:03:51.520 by a court. What actually happened was a court decision in Quebec said that Canada's MAID rules

00:03:57.680 were too restrictive. And the Liberal government responded with a significant expansion. And then

00:04:03.520 the unelected Senate unilaterally decided to put in this additional change that if you had only a

00:04:11.360 mental illness, no physical ailment whatsoever, you'd be eligible for MAID. They passed it. They

00:04:16.380 kicked it back to the House of Commons. And the Liberal government under Trudeau, with David Lamedi at the

00:04:21.220 time being the Attorney General, decided to move this forward in spite of massive pushback from the

00:04:28.400 mental health field, the health care field, disability rights activists, a lot of people in

00:04:33.520 this space from a number of different sectors, conservative, liberal, didn't matter. And what they

00:04:39.000 did is they put in place a date that this would go into effect and said, well, we'll figure out the

00:04:44.760 details later. We'll figure out how we prevent abuse later. They couldn't do that in time. They still

00:04:50.080 haven't done that. They've had to extend this date a couple of times. But right now, if nothing

00:04:55.520 happens, as of March 17, 2027, people with a serious mental illness will be able to go through

00:05:02.560 the MAID process. Now, this was something that is very near and dear to my heart. I've shared

00:05:07.420 publicly, I've shared it with my former listeners and viewers here. I am a suicide survivor myself. I

00:05:13.540 almost lost my life about 15 years ago to a suicide attempt after a prolonged battle with mental

00:05:19.360 illness that very nearly took my life. I'm convinced that I would have gone through the

00:05:25.440 MAID system 15 years ago. And given how we've seen this system unfold, I might have been successful in

00:05:31.640 getting that sign off and having my life ended, which means I wouldn't be here today. I wouldn't

00:05:36.160 have a loving wife. I wouldn't have the career I have. I wouldn't have all of the wonderful people

00:05:40.980 I've met and worked with over the last decade and a half. So that was why I launched the I Got

00:05:46.480 Better campaign to highlight stories of healing and show why the stakes are so high if we go down

00:05:52.540 the road of granting MAID for people with mental illness. Some say the bubbles in an arrow truffle

00:05:58.020 piece can take 34 seconds to melt in your mouth. Sometimes the very amount you're stuck at the same

00:06:03.200 red light. Rich, creamy, chocolatey arrow truffle. Feel the arrow bubbles melt. It's mind bubbling.

00:06:10.500 Well, it's unbelievable. And Andrew, I thank you for sharing your story. I saw that you posted a video

00:06:16.520 on social media telling your very personal story. And I know it's not easy to do that. You sort of

00:06:22.660 go through what personally happened to you. I want to say, you know, it takes a strong man to come out

00:06:29.680 and admit that you suffered through that. You had a problem. I'm just reading some of the comments

00:06:35.120 here, Mario Zaleja. He writes, what a legend. It takes a strong, confident man to talk about this.

00:06:39.680 Congrats on overcoming this and the massive impact you're having on society. And I think especially

00:06:45.240 to young men, I think that what you went through, a lot of other people are going through. We saw

00:06:51.960 a huge increase in the sort of diseases of despair, especially during COVID and particularly how it hits

00:06:58.640 young men. And so I'm just wondering, like, what is your message to other young men out there that

00:07:04.500 might be suffering through something like this? One of the things that's really important about

00:07:09.420 mental illness is it affects different groups differently. And, you know, there is a huge push

00:07:14.020 now. I shouldn't say huge, but there's a larger push now around men's mental health because people

00:07:19.240 have realized how men have a unique hurdle on seeking help for this. And it's not to say that it's

00:07:26.180 worse or better. It's just different. You know, there are pressures that men put on themselves.

00:07:30.580 There are pressures that society puts on men, the pressure to provide, the pressure to perform,

00:07:35.780 to be a certain way. And there's also this expectation of being stoic and strong and tough.

00:07:42.280 And I think this is where it's really, really important to have these conversations to ensure

00:07:47.260 that there are supports available there and that we're not normalizing the desire to end your life.

00:07:53.860 And that's the other key here is that there are going to be people that because of their mental

00:07:58.500 illness go through the MAID process because they're going to be permitted to do that. 1.00

00:08:03.700 But by giving that eligibility, we also create this other problem, which is that we basically give

00:08:09.500 a green light to the idea that ending your life because of mental illness is the right thing to 1.00

00:08:14.640 do. And I'm actually, and again, this is speculative on my part, but I am worried that

00:08:19.860 there's going to be an increase in non-MAID suicides because now all of a sudden we've said,

00:08:24.320 you know what, this actually makes sense. This is a logical, reasonable thing to want.

00:08:29.140 And that to me is very concerning. And I can't stress enough, this is a life or death issue.

00:08:33.760 And Bill C-218 will save lives if it's passed.

00:08:37.120 Well, I do want to shift it back to medical assistance and dying, the euphemism that we use.

00:08:42.760 Really, it's euthanasia. It's assisted suicide. It's going to a doctor and saying that,

00:08:48.460 you know, my life is over now or whatever the circumstances. Andrew, you've seen this

00:08:54.160 during your time at True North. There have been reports of doctors or even government officials

00:08:59.380 offering this as a solution to people who are suffering. So, I mean, now that you're on the

00:09:05.600 other side and you're a member of parliament, is this something that concerns you that not only is

00:09:09.620 this just sort of available in the background, but it's something that's often actively promoted

00:09:14.700 and given it as an option to Canadians who would not have otherwise considered it?

00:09:20.900 We have all heard the horror stories of the veteran that wants a wheelchair lift and is instead 1.00

00:09:26.540 offered maid or people who have sought it and been granted it because of poverty, because they don't

00:09:32.080 like their living conditions. And these situations are tragic. And I think the one most important thing

00:09:37.380 here is that we have to support people in what they need to want to live their life.

00:09:43.600 And that's oftentimes what's missing in this. And if you look at some of the numbers, even from the

00:09:48.840 Canadian maid reports, you see people that, you know, they're dealing with a medical issue,

00:09:53.000 but they also put as a reason for wanting maid loneliness. They put poverty, they put isolation,

00:10:00.960 they put these other things in there, which are not medical things, are not medical qualities. It could

00:10:06.740 actually be combated in a very real way. There was a case recently where Scott Adams, a cartoonist in

00:10:15.120 the United States, I was just reading about this, was very close to using maid and his life because of

00:10:19.900 cancer. But he finally found one treatment that was able to ease his suffering long enough to want to be

00:10:26.820 alive, even though he knows his days are numbered. We see time and time again, people who go through the

00:10:33.060 system. And there are other externalities beyond their immediate suffering that are causing them

00:10:39.540 to seek this. And, you know, what we're dealing with in this legislation is the mental health

00:10:43.520 component, because that same issue is there. We know that there is treatment and support available.

00:10:48.400 And we also know there's a capacity issue as well. When someone wants to end their life because of a

00:10:53.720 mental illness, that we typically view that as a symptom. And we treat it and intervene. And actually,

00:10:59.300 the state has the right to commit someone to stop them from ending their life because we realize that

00:11:05.720 protecting the vulnerable is one of the areas where you have a role for government. So if I go in

00:11:13.380 to a doctor's office and I say, doctor, I'm dealing with depression. It's really difficult.

00:11:18.460 I want to end my life. Well, how do we know when that legal and ethical responsibility to stop me kicks

00:11:25.120 in versus the provision of services of, OK, here's a maid pamphlet?

00:11:30.080 Well, I mean, that's the shocking part of it all. I don't know if you've read Tristan Hopper's

00:11:34.440 book, but he talks about how Canada has become like a cautionary tale. And when they were debating

00:11:39.360 having some kind of a euthanasia program in the UK, both parties were worried not to allow their

00:11:44.880 system to become like Canada, where it is just too often used. I mean, the fact that it's such a leading

00:11:51.680 cause of death in Canada now that we've seen this 13 fold growth just in less than a decade

00:11:58.860 since it's been brought in, it seems like a big issue, Andrew. And yet we don't really hear a lot

00:12:04.380 about it aside from, you know, the bravery it took for you to put out this video in this private

00:12:08.280 members bill. You know, is this something that you think that you will get support across the aisle

00:12:14.140 from? Are there other MPs, even from other parties and within your own party that agree that this

00:12:19.040 program has probably gone too far? We're hoping. I mean, this is and should be a nonpartisan issue.

00:12:25.200 There was a bill in the previous parliament seeking to do exactly what this one is, and it fell short

00:12:30.300 by only a handful of votes. It had support from all of the Conservatives, all of the New Democrats,

00:12:35.540 both of the Greens at the time, and eight Liberals as well. And this current bill, which we're putting

00:12:41.900 forward, I'm hopeful will receive support from across the aisle. If the Conservatives and the New

00:12:47.880 Democrats and the Green MP Elizabeth May all support it, it will pass if 20 Liberal MPs get

00:12:54.780 behind it. 20 Liberal MPs. That's the math on that. So there are some Liberals on there that have been

00:13:00.140 very outspoken in support of what we're trying to do. I hope to see more of that. This is, again,

00:13:05.820 a Liberal government that claims it's a new government. Perhaps Marnie will do the right 0.84

00:13:10.060 thing here as Prime Minister and have his Attorney General get behind this. I do not want to score

00:13:14.760 political points off this. I want to save lives, and I want to prevent people going through what

00:13:19.420 I went through 15 years ago from doing something irreversible. And I hope we can get support from

00:13:24.320 that. And that's my call to action to all of your listeners and viewers, Candace, is no matter where

00:13:29.040 you are in the country, no matter who your MP is, whether you like them or not, reach out to them and

00:13:33.200 ask them to support this bill. Ask them to support C218. If you have experience with mental illness

00:13:38.560 yourself, share that with your Member of Parliament. Make sure they know there's a human face on

00:13:42.660 this. And that's the spirit behind the I Got Better campaign, which at the risk of shamelessly

00:13:47.600 plugging is at igotbetter.ca. Well, what a great initiative, Andrew. I really applaud. You

00:13:52.260 congratulate you for that. While you're here, I want to ask you, though, because we've talked about

00:13:56.080 this on the show yesterday. This has become a huge firestorm in the middle of a summer. Usually

00:13:59.580 summers are quiet for news stories. But I think a lot of people are concerned by the story of

00:14:04.300 Sean Foyt. So basically, the CBC painted this guy as if he was some kind of an extremist and

00:14:09.080 some kind of a mega rock star because he supports Republicans and Donald Trump in the States.

00:14:15.100 That doesn't really have anything to do with his concerts, though. He's a worship leader,

00:14:19.220 a Christian singer. He had a tour planned across Canada. Apparently, it's his third year

00:14:22.740 in a row touring across Canada. But suddenly, he became very controversial and has had his permit

00:14:27.980 revoked in cities across eastern Canada from Halifax to Montreal. In Montreal, we saw that showdown

00:14:33.760 with the police, with Antifa, where they fire bombed a church using a smoke bomb in the middle

00:14:39.400 of a performance, which is, as I walked through on the show yesterday, there is a criminal code

00:14:44.300 offense against interrupting a church service or a service of worship. And that's exactly what

00:14:50.160 these Antifa thugs did right in front of the police. I saw that you wrote a lengthy post about

00:14:56.400 this on X, Andrew. And I'm wondering if you can comment on what's happening and what you make of

00:15:03.540 it all. Look, the idea that you need a permit to engage in worship, regardless of your religion,

00:15:10.380 is absolutely absurd. I have been clear going into politics and throughout my media career that

00:15:16.260 freedom of expression is my hill to die on. And when I see the interruption of a religious concert,

00:15:23.360 which is, again, it's worship, I'm very concerned by it. Again, I stand up for freedom of expression

00:15:29.060 and freedom of religion on principle. I don't need to agree with or share someone's religious

00:15:33.500 practices or what they say. And I say that not as a denunciation of Sean Foyke, but I literally had

00:15:40.340 never heard of him before, before, you know, two or three days ago, whenever it was that this came up.

00:15:45.420 And, you know, I don't actually care what his beliefs are, care what he says. I would stand up for

00:15:50.780 his right to engage in the work that he's doing and not be harassed by bureaucrats. Now, again, I mean,

00:15:57.600 the nature of freedom of expression is that you have to protect people who are saying things that

00:16:02.540 you disagree with if you want to have any consistency and moral clarity on this. And, you know, in this

00:16:07.600 case, it's a Christian singer. And I get people have raised all sorts of issues with him about, you

00:16:12.780 know, how he's run his business and all of that. And none of that matters. All of that's a

00:16:16.760 distraction. At the end of the day, you know, his right to speak, his right to sing, a church's right

00:16:22.420 to host him, those are decisions to be made by them. And people can decide whether they want to

00:16:26.520 go. There is no place for the government in that equation at all. Well, you raise a really

00:16:30.680 interesting point. I'm just going to read a little bit about comparing it to something that happened

00:16:33.980 under the Harper government. So you wrote, 17 years ago, the Canadian arts community and political

00:16:37.780 left raised holy hell about a bill from Harper government that would have blocked tax credits 0.75

00:16:42.540 for film projects that went against public policy. That proposal which the conservatives

00:16:47.500 ultimately scrapped was lambasted as censorship. Of course, it was no such thing. The government has

00:16:53.020 no obligation to fund any particular piece of art. Punishing people for what they create is another

00:16:57.960 story. And then you write about how that reminds you of what's happening here. I mean, I don't really

00:17:02.740 expect there to be consistency from these people just because I'm talking about people in the woke

00:17:09.840 left. Like, like, yeah, they'll criticize the conservatives for doing something and then

00:17:12.720 they'll turn around and do the exact same thing without any sense of shame or irony. But it is

00:17:18.160 interesting how, you know, back then, even just saying that we're not going to fund, and I think

00:17:23.920 the specific example was like, anti Alberta energy activists or something like that, saying that the

00:17:30.480 government doesn't have to fund them. And that was considered censorship. And here we have them

00:17:34.160 actually blocking a church service, and endangering them. But even I mean, the fact that someone threw

00:17:41.520 that smoke bomb, and you can see with such grace, right, Sean Fout just picks it up, hands it to

00:17:47.200 another church leader, who just calmly walks it out the door, right? They weren't panicking,

00:17:50.480 they weren't trying to fight, they weren't trying to agitate, they were really just trying to pray.

00:17:55.520 And the fact that the police just stood by while that happened, and I don't think anyone was arrested,

00:18:00.320 I don't think anybody was charged. It seems just like a blatant and ugly double standard. And to me,

00:18:05.760 it shows anti-Christian bigotry and an anti-American hatred in our country by the same people who are

00:18:12.000 sitting here saying, you have to be inclusive, we believe in diversity, no hate, hate has no home

00:18:18.160 here. And yet they're showing all of those things. I mean, there's just so much irony here. Andrew,

00:18:22.240 what do you make of it all? I think you need to be able to apply whatever the rules are evenly.

00:18:28.080 And I know people have pointed out some very radical, hateful protests and demonstrations

00:18:32.320 that have taken place in Montreal that have not attracted the ire of Montreal by-law enforcement,

00:18:38.240 that have not received condemnation for operating without a so-called permit. So I think at the end

00:18:44.960 of the day here, what's going to happen is we're going to have to have a conversation in this country

00:18:48.800 about the assaults that are taking place about freedoms. And if anyone's interested, I talked about

00:18:53.600 this in my maiden speech in the House of Commons, in which I said that I wanted to make Canada

00:18:57.840 a freer place. And that was motivating my entry to politics. You know, we need to have the freedom

00:19:02.720 to worship, the freedom to pray, the freedom to sing, the freedom to engage in art, the freedom to

00:19:07.840 express our political opinions. And we cannot allow governments of any level to get in the way of

00:19:13.760 that. And I'm very glad that so many of my colleagues have spoken up about this as well. And

00:19:18.000 Jamil Javani has specifically talked about attacks on the right to worship in a motion he's put forward

00:19:24.240 before the Heritage Committee, which I think is very much one that should be getting some more

00:19:29.120 attention as well. Well, Andrew, I know you're just getting started in Ottawa and as a member

00:19:33.600 of Parliament, you're doing great work already. We appreciate your time and you joining the program.

00:19:37.360 Andrew Lawton, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Candice. All right, folks,

00:19:41.200 that's all the time we have for today. Thanks so much for tuning in. I'm Candice Malcolm. This is

00:19:43.840 Candice Malcolm Show. We'll be back again tomorrow with all the news. Thank you and God bless.

The Candice Malcolm Show - July 30, 2025

“I’d probably be dead right now”— MP sounds alarm on Canada’s suicide agenda

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