Labor’s national conference has written into the party platform support for telehealth as part of voluntary assisted dying care.

The amendment, passed on a voice vote, was the first of the conference that has been contested. It said:

Labor will remove barriers that exist in federal law to the provision of end-of-life care (including via telehealth) as part of lawful access to voluntary assisted dying in the states and territories, while maintaining appropriate clinical safeguards.

Labor will remove barriers that exist in federal law to the provision of end-of-life care (including via telehealth) as part of lawful access to voluntary assisted dying in the states and territories, while maintaining appropriate clinical safeguards.

Moving the amendment, Ryan Batchelor, a member of the Victorian Legislative Council, said voluntary assisted dying care was not easy to access for many of those living in regional and remote Australia.

The amendment would commit federal Labor to remove the barriers to allow state law to work unfettered, he said.

Caitlin Tough, a member of the ACT Legislative Assembly, told the conference:

A doctor may lawfully have a conversation across a desk, but they face criminal risk for the same communication by telephone or video.

A doctor may lawfully have a conversation across a desk, but they face criminal risk for the same communication by telephone or video.

She said Commonwealth criminal code provisions were........

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