KJ to bring AGC report on suicide decriminalisation to cabinet soon

Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said he has received the completed report from the Attorney-General Chambers (AGC) on the proposal to decriminalise suicide attempts and will be bringing the matter to the cabinet soon.

He will also discuss the report findings with the other stakeholders, which are the Home Ministry and the police.

“I brought a cabinet memorandum for us to have a moratorium on criminalising suicide first, but at the time, the cabinet said it would be better to have a report from the AGC first before making any decision on a moratorium or directly amending the Penal Code.

“In this session, we will discuss the findings by the AGC and will review the cabinet memorandum which has already been prepared and bring it to the cabinet meeting,” Khairy (above) told reporters after attending an event to handover allocation to mental health NGOs at the Health Ministry in Putrajaya today.

As such, he said whether this amendment will be tabled in the upcoming Dewan Rakyat session starting next week will depend heavily on the cabinet’s decision on the memorandum.

However, Khairy noted that the Home Ministry did not seem to agree with the decriminalisation of suicide when he brought it up the last time.

“Let’s see if they can be influenced to support our efforts to decriminalise suicide attempts because from what I heard during the meeting, their arguments were not that strong to me as the health minister,” he said.

Under Section 309 of the Penal Code, attempting suicide is punishable by up to one-year imprisonment, a fine, or both.

It was first reported in September 2021 that the AGC was considering decriminalising suicide attempts after the government studied laws regarding suicide attempts in the UK, New Zealand, India and Singapore.

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