(LifeSiteNews) — Pierre Poilievre, leader of Canada’s Conservative Party (CPC), said there needs to be restrictions on euthanasia during an appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast. But he also said people should still be able to choose the procedure if they want it.
Poilievre’s sit-down interview with Rogan, posted earlier this week, has garnered close to 2 million views. The interview covered a variety of topics, including general politics, “MAiD” (Medical Assistance in Dying), tariffs, U.S. President Donald Trump, and Poilievre’s election loss to Mark Carney.
The Conservative leader told Rogan he supports a private member’s bill which, if passed, would ban any person in government or another authority from proposing euthanasia to someone who did not request it.
“Our system needs to be geared towards giving people all the best options to live on rather than just suggesting MAiD as the easy, as the automatic path for the system to impose on people,” he told Rogan.
“So one of the things our party is pushing for is to make clear that public servants who are getting phone calls from people who are in need of help for something. They shouldn’t be offering that. They shouldn’t be offering MAiD.”
READ: The world is waking up to the horror of euthanasia
Poilievre’s MAiD comments weak compared to his more pro-life MPs views
Poilievre said that “people can seek [MAiD] out if they want,” but added “you’re calling up saying. ‘I’m poor’ or ‘I’m struggling’ or ‘I’m having a mental illness’ or ‘I’ve got an injury,’ we shouldn’t have a government worker saying, ‘Well, consider MAiD.’”
Rogan had told Poilievre that he had “concerns” over Canada’s expansion of MAiD. Around one in 20 Canadians die from MAiD every year.
Rogan, like Poilievre, is not fully pro-life, saying there is a “place for” MAiD. Like the Conservative leader, he thinks it should be severely limited in scope.
Poilievre, in his comments to Rogan, was referring to Conservative MP Garnett Genuis’ Bill C-260, “An Act to amend the Criminal Code (medical assistance in dying — protection against coercion).” This bill was introduced last month.
Genuis said that his bill comes after multiple reports of veterans and others who have been coerced into dying by state-sanctioned MAiD.
READ: Elderly Canadian woman offered euthanasia before doctor even asked what was wrong with her
“If passed, this law will provide robust protection for people with disabilities, veterans, and others who are trying to access government services,” he told reporters last month.
Genuis, who is fully pro-life, was happy his party leader spoke in favor of the aspects of Bill C-260.
“While speaking on The @joeroganExperience,@PierrePoilievre endorses my Bill C-260, the Care Not Coercion Act,” he wrote in a post on X.
“Canada needs this bill as an important step to protecting people from MAID Coercion.”
As reported by LifeSiteNews, Poilievre’s home province of Alberta is cracking down on the deadly practice.
The Safeguards for Last Resort Termination of Life Act, or Bill 18, was announced by Alberta Premier Danielle Smith earlier in the week. Smith said the bill “strengthens safeguards and restores clear limits on eligibility to protect vulnerable Albertans facing mental illness or living with disabilities.”
READ: Joe Rogan: ‘I’m fascinated by the story of Jesus Christ’
In 2021, the federal government under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau expanded euthanasia from killing “terminally ill” patients to allowing the chronically ill to qualify after the passage of Bill C-7. Since then, the government has sought to include those suffering solely from mental illness.
In February 2024, the federal government delayed the mental illness expansion until 2027 after pushback from pro-life, medical, and mental health groups, as well as most of Canada’s provinces.
The Liberal government under Prime Ministers Trudeau and Mark Carney, however, has worked to expand euthanasia 13-fold since it was legalized in 2016. Canada now has the fastest-growing assisted suicide program in the world. Meanwhile, Health Canada released a series of studies on advanced requests for assisted suicide.
Euthanasia is now the sixth-highest cause of death in Canada, after it was not listed in Statistics Canada’s top 10 leading causes of death from 2019 to 2022.
