Medical Assistance in Dying committee  No, I'm not telling you that. I'm telling you the report—

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  That's correct. A small proportion of the total number of MAID cases comes to us.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  It would represent probably less than 10% of all MAID cases in Canada.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Mr. Cooper, I think you asked me this question last year, and I think I indicated at that time that enforcement is not the job of the federal government, and it is not the role of the monitoring system. In the rare occasion—or a hypothetical occasion—that there was some reason to believe the report was incomplete, we would interact with the person who provided the report, but we do not have the kind of data that would make it reasonable for us to advise law enforcement.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  I think it's a little bit the demography: the nature of the population, the age, the education and so on. The other thing—I alluded to this earlier—is that there has been an incredible effort in the health authorities operating on Vancouver Island to make sure that MAID is accessible.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  It's not at this point. Look, there is variability across the country. We know that. Everybody knows that the rate in Quebec in terms of the whole province is considerably higher than that of Ontario and B.C. I think that if we saw a rapid spike to 7% across the whole country, which I don't anticipate but if we saw that, then I think it might be wise and prudent to look into that.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  No, we do not.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  It isn't. I think there is some information we could get from the pediatric medical community about incidence. You could find information about, for example, pediatric cancer and the outcomes in terms of morbidity and mortality, but not for most other diseases.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  I can respond to that. I can't give you an exact number, but I can tell you that for every report that comes to us for every case from each provider, if there is information missing or it appears that an answer may be incomplete, then there is communication back to the provider.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  I can do that, but I can tell you now that I don't see that money is being diverted from palliative care to the promotion of MAID. I don't think that's currently happening.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  If the question is addressed to me, Mr. Barrett, I'll try to respond. I don't think this is a systemic disregard for the legislation. The legislation says that someone can only give informed consent to receive medical assistance in dying after they have been informed of the means that are available to relieve their suffering, including palliative care.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  That's absolutely right. A province could decide that it wishes to proceed with a regime that is more restrictive than that of the federal government. Depending on the nature of that more restrictive regime, that jurisdiction could be subject to legal challenge. I don't want to say that this is akin to the case of Truchon and Gladu, because that challenged the regime in both Quebec and Canada, but that risk certainly is there.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  Perhaps I can respond to that. I think it probably makes sense to start by acknowledging that there have not been the consultations that are required with indigenous communities. I am not referring to indigenous people as one single population bloc; obviously the distinctions-based approach that's now conventional needs to be pursued in this particular case.

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  —no single indigenous person can speak for the entirety of their community, and certainly not for all indigenous people. The question is this: How can people be sensitized so that they are aware of the kinds of considerations that should be introduced into a conversation about MAID or the practice of MAID when indigenous people are involved?

Medical Assistance in Dying committee  That's correct.