The Delta Hospice Society is considering appealing a B.C. Supreme Court decision blocking its members from voting to change their constitution.

The B.C. Supreme Court decision was delivered Friday, June 12. According to former board member Christopher Pettypiece, who filed the petition, the court stopped a June 15 meeting that would have launched a mail-in vote asking membership if they were interested in becoming a Christian society. Pettypiece also said the judge said the board acted in bad faith and manipulated the vote by rejecting some membership applications to the society. The court has not yet published the order.

“We’re delighted with the outcome,” Pettypiece told the Delta Optimist.

But Delta Hospice Society president Angelina Ireland is disappointed with the ruling and told The B.C. Catholic an appeal is being considered.

“The Delta Hospice Society is a private society – not public,” she said.

In an affidavit filed to the B.C. Supreme Court, Ireland argued the society’s acceptance of certain membership applications, and its rejection of 310 of them, was in line with the Societies Act. She added cancelling or postponing the extraordinary meeting results in $11,500 in costs for the small non-profit.

The Delta Hospice Society has been under fire after steadfastly refusing to permit medical aid in dying (MAID) in the Irene Thomas Hospice in Delta. (The society oversees the 10-bed hospice as well as a charity thrift shop and various community programs for the very ill and dying and their families.)

Ireland and hospice founder Nancy Macey maintain assisted suicide is contrary to the aims of hospice care and the society’s constitution. The mail-in ballot scheduled June 15 would have asked the 1,500 members of the society if they were in favour of becoming a Christian society. Faith-based organizations are currently exempt from the mandate to allow assisted suicide on their premises.

Two-thirds of voters have to be in favour to effect any change.

“We are highly concerned with the lack of justice in the court system today,” Ireland said in response to the June 12 court decision.

While that conversation has been blocked from the ballot box, it has been playing out in the public arena. Hundreds of people were seen protesting the Delta Hospice Society board at a Ladner park June 13, wearing masks and carrying slogans including “My Life My Choice” and “Save our hospice! Choice for ALL!”

Pettypiece and MLA Ian Paton were among those at the rally.

“I stand in solidarity with the hospice staff, volunteers, and donors who have publicly denounced the cynical gamesmanship of the current hospice board. It’s time for Angelina Ireland to do the right thing and resign as chair of the board and give this hospice back to the people of Delta,” said Paton, the Delta Optimist reported.

But a sizeable number of people support the hospice’s stance on euthanasia; an online petition by the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition supporting the hospice and opposing assisted suicide in hospice facilities has more than 26,000 signatures.

For more on this story, see previous B.C. Catholic coverage, below.