'A person's quality of death is part of their quality of life'

And bugger off I did, of sorts.

I'd been trying to wet his parched lips and tongue: he'd been struggling to breathe. I thought it would help. But he didn't want any part of it. And fair enough, too.

Even as he was slipping away, he felt enough was enough. His time had come and he didn't want me or anyone else getting in his way.

It was his choice. We respected that.

My father didn't like to see people suffer.

When it was his turn, well, he didn't like the suffering either. But he endured treatments, the ups and downs, the downright ugly, and in the end he had one request of his doctors: "Let me go home to die."

It was his choice. We respected that.

Fast forward 16 years and, if he was here today I reckon he'd be pumping the air at Victoria's introduction of voluntary assisted dying. Joining him in the jubilation would have been my brother, a victim of motor neurone disease.

It devastated him, his family and friends. He gradually wasted away, unable to walk, feed himself and, near the end, even talk.

What didn't change was his eyes: the look of total despair ... of having absolutely no control over when he would go. Would it be soon; would it be later? He just wanted it to be over. It took almost two years. He was 66.

It wasn't his choice to get motor neurone disease; it wasn't his choice to linger so long that his brain was almost the only thing in his wracked body that could function.

If he'd had the choice, would it have ended much sooner? We'll never know.

On the other hand, my late mother had a will to live. She didn't want to go until the very end.

With her tiny body withering away and her mind clouded by dementia, she showed a fighting spirit I envied. We always said she was a tough old bird: and she lived up to the tag big time.

I recall gently whispering to her one day that it was all right - if she wanted to go, she could. "I'm not ready yet," came the stern reply.

It was several weeks before she took her final breath; she held on for as long as she could.

It was her choice. We respected that.

And so we must respect the choice of those who, facing death from a terminal illness, make the decision to legally end their lives under the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act.

It is their choice, and what gives us the right to take that from them?

Not everyone who supports assisted dying will do it. But what is clear is that they want that choice.

Victoria has had the conversation. "A person's quality of death is part of their quality of life," Premier Daniel Andrews said.

In Queensland, a government inquiry into aged care, end-of-life and palliative care and voluntary assisted dying is due to report in November.

The Western Australian Government is currently looking at voluntary assisted dying legislation.

Public submissions are being sought by South Australia's parliamentary inquiry into End of Life Choices.

Dying with Dignity Tasmania is researching a Bill on voluntary assisted dying to be presented to Parliament later this year.

A bill to legalise voluntary assisted dying failed by a single vote in the NSW Upper House in 2017.

Conversations about assisted dying are not easy, and the matter is far from black and white.

All eyes now turn to Victoria where it is anticipated that 100 to 150 people a year will access voluntary assisted dying.