A report on expanding who is eligible for assisted suicide will be examined by a special joint parliamentary committee in Canada.

The panel of MPs and senators is considering whether so-called “medical assistance in dying” [MAiD] should be expanded to people solely suffering from mental illness and to ‘mature minors’.

It is also considering whether it should let people opt in to assisted suicide in advance before they lose the mental capacity to do so.

The committee was also tasked with studying a host of associated issues, such as the state of palliative care in Canada and the protection of Canadians with disabilities.

The government already agreed in Bill C-7 passed last March to lift the current ban on assisted dying for those suffering solely from mental illness in 2023.

It set up a separate panel of experts to advise on the rules that should apply in those cases and the panel made 19 recommendations in a report tabled earlier this month.