With 126 yes and 262 no, the Chamber rejects the suppressive amendments to article one of the text with provisions on medically assisted voluntary death. A long-awaited vote also because a possible go-ahead for the amendment would have made the entire law expire and put the majority in difficulty, which, on this issue, remains divided.
The phones of the deputies, already in the morning, are studded with messages from the secretaries of the Chamber asking for their presence. But group leaders and party leaders are also mobilized to avoid surprises about the numbers. “The numbers are uncertain,” explains those who are advocating the law. Also for this reason, the secretary of the Democratic Party, Enrico Letta, spoke on Twitter to remind: «Today the text on assisted suicide arrives in the Chamber. It covers the regulatory vacuum that is generating so many dramatic situations. The text makes it possible to recover all the indications contained in the sentence of the Constitutional Court of 2019. It is a duty to legislate in this field “.
An “appeal” that hits the mark given that, from the classroom records, the deputies of the Democratic Party and those of Leu appear to be the most present. The leader of the League, Matteo Salvini, explains instead: «I think of you as the Holy Father. I am for life and the League in Parliament today will behave accordingly and vote for life ». That the numbers, for the majority, are in the balance is also perceived during the explanations of vote. «We are not called to make a derby: on measures of this nature there are no derbies between those who want to make people suffer and those who want to put an end to suffering. This is not the issue at stake and those who use these arguments, not only do a bad thing, but use a rhetorical argument to delegitimize those who think differently “, warns the Forza Italia deputy Antonio Palmieri, inviting them to” get out of the emotional trap that it was aimed at public opinion “.
And if for the deputy of Italia Viva, Massimo Ungaro, “the freedom of the individual is the highest expression of life” especially when it is exercised “in its darkest moments”, for the Forza Italia colleague, Pierantonio Zanettin, “the law we already voted on Euthanasia in 2017 and it is called the law on the bio testament. What we are dealing with here is the murder of the consenting party. It’s a murder. ” The president of Noi con Italia, Maurizio Lupi, asks “who decides the value of a life”, while the president of the Justice Commission, Mario Perantoni considers the rejection of the suppressive amendment “a positive signal from the Chamber that I hope it will be welcomed positively by that vast piece of society that has felt disappointed by the non-admission of the referendum question “.