Federal laws on inciting suicide are intended to encompass phone consults on voluntary euthanasia, placing GPs at legal risk of $200,000 fines, lawyers for the Attorney-General have said.

As states have legalised voluntary assisted dying (VAD), questions have remained over whether a 2005 amendment to the Criminal Code Act, banning “using a carriage service to counsel suicide”, would apply to VAD telehealth consults.

But it is only now the Federal Government has acknowledged that the law could be used in this way, in a submission to a Federal Court case brought by Melbourne GP Dr Nick Carr.

Dr Carr is attempting to secure a judicial ruling that VAD is not suicide in an attempt to allow doctors to talk about VAD with patients, particularly those in rural and remote areas, over the phone and via email.