2026 EXIT CANBERRA CONFERENCE

21 - 22 September

Remembering ROTI

Looking Back on 30 Years of VE Activism

Ainslie FC
52 Wakefield Ave
Ainslie ACT

Background to the Conference

Thirty years ago this year, the Northern Territory of Australia made history when prostate cancer sufferer, Bob Dent, became the first person in the world to receive a legal, lethal voluntary injection.

The Northern Territory was first because the Netherlands had not yet passed a law. Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act was tied up in legal action and had not yet been implemented.

This made the Northern Territory’s Rights of the Terminally Ill Act the first operating law to allow a person who was terminally ill to get medical help to die.

Politics at Play

Sadly, the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act lasted only 9 months before it was overturned by a conscience vote in the Australian Parliament. ROTI was a law before its time.

The vote came about following dirty, backroom politics by members of Parliament on both sides of the aisle. A recap of this history can be read HERE

Chief opponents of ROTI included Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Victoria) and Tony Burke who was then the president of Young Labor and the director of the ‘Euthanasia No’ lobby group.

At the time Kevin Andrews boasted that his private members’ bill would set the voluntary euthanasia movement back 20 years. He was not wrong.

Fast Forward to Today

Thirty years later and the Northen Territory is the last jurisdiction in Australia to pass a right to die law. From leading the world, this special part of Australia is now – ironically – the laggard.

Over the past 30 years multiple countries in Europe, many states of the US (and all states of Australia), as well as countries such as New Zealand and Canada have passed end of life laws.

Why is the Conference in September?

On 22 September 1996, Bob Dent died quietly in the arms of his wife Judy. Bob used the ‘Deliverance Machine’ which had been built by Dr Phillip Nitschke to deliver an injection (infusion) that would end his suffering. This iconic machine can now be found in the British Science Museum in London.

Exit’s 30th Anniversary Conference commemorates this historic day.

Canberra Program

This 30th Anniversary conference is unapologetically nostalgic in focus. The multimedia program is intended to provide an inspiring, yet critical, appraisal of the history of Voluntary Euthanasia in Australia: from people who were there. The conference will consider what happened and the lessons we can bring forward. The critical question asked at the conference is ‘what is the future of dignified dying?’

Joining us in Canberra are...

Helga Khuse

Philosopher, Bioethicist, Author - Willing to Listen Wanting to Die & Inspiration for the ROTI Act

Born in 1940, Helga Khuse has a long and illustrious career of intellectual thought, writing and activism. As the co-founder of: the Monash University Centre for Human Bioethics (with Peter Singer), the journal Bioethics and the International Association of Bioethics, Dr Kuhse is many things to many people.

In the context of our conference, Helga is credited as Marshall Perron’s inspiration for creating the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act.

Helga is an unsung hero of the Australian and international right to die debate.

Now retired, she remains one of the most important and influential utilitarian philosophical voices globally.

Marshall Perron

Former Chief Minister of the NT & Architect of the ROTI Act

Born in 1942, Marshall Perron was a founding member of the Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory and was Chief Minister of the Northern Territory from 1988 – 1995. Perron resigned from Parliament on the eve of the passing of the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act.

Marshall represented the divisions of Stuart Park and Fannie Bay for the Country Liberal Party. As a legendary Northern Territory politician, Perron is remembered as straight-talking and charismatic. His political/ professional legacy is, without doubt, the world’s first dying with dignity law.

Bob Brown

Former Australian Greens Senator & Social Justice Activist

Born in 1944, Bob Brown is a strong supporter of a person’s right to die with dignity. Bob is a founder of the Australian Greens and served three terms as Tasmanian Senator and the Parliamentary Leader of the Australian Greens in the Federal Parliament of Australia. Dr Brown has a history of social activism on many issues beyond his passion for the environment (eg. nuclear free, gay law reform and freedom of information). Both inside and outside Parliament, Bob has always been an outspoken pro-choice political voice. Bob did what he could to help (unsucessfully) a fifth person to use the ROTI Act immediately prior to the passing of the Euthanasia Laws Act.

David Swanton

Exit Canberra Chapter Coordinator & Right to Die Campaigner

Born in 1959, David Swanton attended Sydney University and gained a doctorate in chemistry before a long career in academia and the Australian public service. David has been active in voluntary euthanasia issues for over 30 years: more recently advocating for a well-being and autonomy-respecting legislative regime in his home territory, the ACT. David has led the Exit group in Canberra for over 20 years. In his retirement, Dr Swanton undertook a global survey of voluntary euthanasia advocates around the world. He is now busy completing his new book on critical thinking and moral philosophy.

Murray McLaughlin

Journalist & Producer of ‘Road to Nowhere’ (ABC 4 Corners)

Murray McLaughlin worked as a journalist for five decades in newspapers, magazines, radio and television in New Zealand, Hong Kong and Australia. In 1996, Murray travelled to Darwin to report on the introduction of the Northern Territory’s Rights of the Terminally Ill Act for the ABC’s flagship, 4 Corners Program. He returned some months later to report on the aftermath of the overturning of the Law.

After a long career at the ABC, the last 15 years based in Darwin, McLaughlin worked at the Northern Land Council. His final position was as manager of policy and communications. In 2019 moved to Canberra to take up the position as advisor to Patrick Dodson, the Labor Senator for Western Australia for five years. In his retirement, McLaughlin has written a book about the Northern Territory’s political and legal history and its impact on the Territory’s Aboriginal population. The book is to be published by Wakefield Press (Adelaide).

Analeine Cal y Mayor

Mexican film director and writer

Analeine’s first feature The Boy Who Smells Like Fish (with Zöe Kravitz and Carrie Ann Moss) premiered in Miami Film Festival and Guadalajara winning best script in Los Angeles at the 2013 WIFTS Visionary Awards. (Women International Film and Television Showcase).

Her other features include The Voice of a Dream, premiered in Morelia Film Festival, Where Birds go to Die and Book of Love, starring Sam Claflin (winner of Best Prime Time feature in Imagen Awards 2022, Los Angeles).

Analeine has directed more than ten TV series from several streaming companies such as Netflix and Prime like ‘Every Minute Counts’ about the earthquake in Mexico City 1985, and ‘Misfortune and Daughter from Another Mother’ and ‘Nothing to See Here’ for Netflix, winning best comedy series and TV series with more Impact at the 1st Edition of Aura Prizes for TV Iberoamerican Series in 2024. Her scripts have won numerous awards including Fundación Carolina, Fundación Toscano Sundance Lab , Fonca Jóvenes Creadores among others.

Analeine’s first feature documentary is Sweet Death, which is co-produced by actor Viggo Mortensen. After opening in cinemas in Mexico, Sweet Death won the ‘best feature documentary’ award at the Ierapetra International Film Festival (2025) and Montreal Women Film Festival (2025). The film won Best Script in the 22nd Barcelona Human Rights Festival (2025).

Philip Nitschke

Founder of Exit International

Born in 1947, Philip is the founder and director of Exit International. From rural South Australia, he attended Adelaide and Flinders University, graduating with a doctorate in experimental physics in 1972. Not long after, he rejected a career in the sciences and headed to the Northern Territory to work with Vincent Lingiari at Wave Hill station during the time of the Gurindji ‘walk off’.

Philip has a long history of social activism on issues ranging from the Vietnam moratorium to opposing US bases in Central Australia and anti-nuclear. However, it has been voluntary euthanasia / assisted suicide that has been Philip’s life’s work. He says that this is a cause that he 'fell into', owing to being in the right place at the right time.

Philip is the inventor of devices such as the Deliverance Machine and the Sarco. He is the author of several books including: Killing Me Softly: Voluntary Euthanasia & the Road to the Peaceful Pill, the Peaceful Pill Handbook and his autobiography Damned if I Do (with Peter Corris). Philip lives in the Netherlands

Program

DAY 1

8am
Registrations

9am
Introduction / Welcome to country

9.30 – 10.30
Marshall Perron Homage with Philip Nitschke
How it happened … until it didn’t

10.30 – 11
Morning tea

11 – 12
Helga Kuhse
Reflections on the coming & going of the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act

12 – 12.45
Lunch

12.45 – 2pm
Murray McLaughlin
Reflections from Darwin following Max Bell’s ‘Road to Nowhere’

2 – 3.15pm
Bob Brown
Reflections from Canberra of a Law in Turmoil

3.15-3.45
Afternoon tea

3.45 – 5
David Swanton in conversation with Philip Nitschke
The Road Ahead – Next 30 Years

5pm
Join us for a glass of bubbles ...

DAY 2

9am - 10am
Coffee & Chat
Audience Open Plenary hosted by David Swanton

10am
Screening of Sweet Death with Introduction by Director, Analeine Cal y Mayor (Mexico)
Duration: 79 minutes

Audience Q&A – Analeine Cal y Mayor and Philip

12:45
Conference close
Lunch

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Conference Location