The Constitutional Court has endorsed for the second time the Euthanasia law approved in 2021, by knocking down the PP's appeal, as it did in March with that of Vox. The ruling itself explains that the arguments of both groups were practically coincident. The new text, which has the dissenting vote of two magistrates, adds two clarifications, which are the endorsement of the way of processing the organic law and limiting conscientious objection only to health professionals, excluding legal entities.
On this occasion, the speaker was President Cándido Conde-Pumpido in which he resolved "those issues that are substantially identical to those raised by the Vox parliamentary group's appeal", in addition to some other new ones.
On the one hand, the PP argued that the law had been processed incorrectly because it was through an organic law proposal from the majority group that supports the Government, which in the opinion of the appellants represented a fraud of law because it
It sought to avoid the issuance of reports from the Council of State, the General Council of the Judiciary, the Fiscal Council and the Bioethics Committee and, thus, restrict parliamentary debate.
The ruling considers the complaints related to processing inconsistent, as was supported in the March ruling.
The second general challenge maintains the incompatibility of the law with the right to life. The ruling insists and clarifies three central issues that were already contained in the first ruling: on the one hand, that euthanasia or the provision of help in dying is based on certain values, principles and fundamental rights enshrined in the constitutional text.
On the other hand - the text states - that the right to life, although it is not a right of will or freedom that guarantees the right to one's own death, "does not impose the obligation to stay alive on its holder either."
And, finally, that the constitutional foundation of euthanasia explains that it cannot be limited, as the appellants claim, to cases of terminally ill patients.
The ruling also rejects the accusations of unconstitutionality of the law in reference to people with disabilities and their access to assistance in dying, as was already established in its doctrine after the March ruling.
On the contrary, the ruling resolves, rejecting them, two new complaints related to the conscientious objection of legal entities and the use of the preferential and summary process to protect euthanasia.
In relation to conscientious objection of legal entities and in accordance with the constitutional configuration of this right, the ruling maintains that the only
Actions that may be exonerated from the legal duty to guarantee the right to provide assistance in dying are the interventions of health professionals, regardless of their professional category, in the effective execution of said provision.
"It is only with respect to such interventions when it must be noted that conflict situations may arise due to intimate, ideological or moral convictions, which justify the withdrawal of the health professional from an intervention that constitutes, in general, a legal imperative," the ruling states.
But beyond these exceptional cases, extending conscientious objection to an institutional setting as the appellants intend, "would not only lack constitutional foundation, but would put at risk the effectiveness of the healthcare provision itself."
The PP starts from the premise that the right to euthanasia cannot be considered a fundamental right, but rather a legally configured right. The ruling recalls that the right to die affects constitutional values and principles linked to freedom and personal dignity, to a fundamental right such as physical and moral integrity.
As they did in the first ruling, judges Enrique Arnaldo and Concepción Espejel have issued a dissenting opinion, which they have already announced will basically be the one they already presented in March, adding their position on the conscientious objection of legal entities and the way to process the law.
