Support wavers for assisted suicide bill

'The more the [assisted suicide] bill is scrutinised, the more obvious it becomes how dangerous it is for the most vulnerable in our society’, the Christian Institute (CI) has said.

Just four days after the CI’s warning, it was reported in The Times that some MPs who initially backed the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill are wavering because of the removal of what was considered a key safeguard. On 11 February, Kim Leadbetter who sponsored the bill, said the requirement for High Court judge to rubberstamp a patient’s decision to end their life would be dropped.

There have been broadening fears that, as drafted, any safeguards under the bill are inadequate; and terminally ill patients who feel they are a burden, or are not provided with adequate palliative care, would be more likely to choose assisted suicide.

Yet several MPs supported a proposed expansion of the eligibility criteria to include patients with neurodegenerative illnesses with 12 months to live.

Not invited

Fifty expert witnesses gave evidence over just three days in January as a committee of MPs considered the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. As drafted, the law would allow terminally ill patients (in England and Wales) with up to six months left to live and who have capacity, to choose assisted dying.

The CI criticised those proceedings as ‘very rushed’; and in an open letter to The Times, 25 leading psychiatrists warned: ‘We are alarmed at the haste of the committee considering the bill for assisted dying.’ They called for it to be ‘overwhelmingly rejected’.

The selection of experts to provide oral evidence to the committee has also been criticised as heavily in favour of the bill. The British Geriatrics Society (BGS), which is opposed to the legislation, was among those not invited to give oral evidence to the committee.

In January, the BGS asked the committee chairs for the opportunity to provide oral evidence, but said it received no response. The BGS president Jugdeep Dhesi said they were ‘extremely disappointed … especially as our patient group is most likely to be affected by the bill’.

The BGS has significant concerns about the lack of effective legal safeguards to protect older people and has submitted written evidence. Dhesi said: ‘Even at this early stage before the possible change in law, we are already hearing of older people rejecting discussions about their end-of-life care for fear they will be encouraged to opt for assisted dying.

‘There is too much at stake to rush through a bill of this magnitude without detailed scrutiny of its complexities and input from those who will be most affected.’

Also absent from the invitation list was Theo Boer, a professor of Health Care Ethics and member of the Dutch Health Council, who has changed his mind about assisted dying, which was legalised in the Netherlands in 2002.

In written evidence to the committee, he explains his increasing concern at developments and the dramatic increase in numbers of assisted deaths. He says: ‘I once believed it was possible to regulate and restrict killing to terminally ill mentally competent adults with less than six months… I was wrong.’

He predicts that any such law will be challenged in the courts as ‘an injustice’, adding: ‘There is not one jurisdiction in the world with some form of legal assisted dying where the practice over the years did not expand into a direction … neither originally envisaged by the lawmakers, nor was part of the original campaigns towards legalisation. There is merely a difference in speed.’

Among experts from other jurisdictions who gave oral evidence were Dr Jessica Kaan, from End of Life Washington, who told MPs that feeling you are a burden was a valid reason to opt for assisted suicide. A Sydney MP said legalised assisted suicide was ‘an important form of suicide prevention’.

Palliative care

Palliative care in the UK is in a woeful state and many hospices are facing significant costs challenges, with some already forced to close. In his written evidence, Professor Boer says: ‘Paradoxically, I doubt whether my country would have legalised assisted dying if we had had the level of palliative care in 1994 that we have now.’

High-profile palliative care doctor Rachel Clarke told MPs: ‘If [high-quality medical care] is not available to you, you are potentially being pushed towards “choosing”… assisted dying’.

Simon Calvert from the CI said: ‘We hope MPs who allowed the Bill to proceed, either for more debate, or to see if it could be improved, will now realise what’s needed is not a Bill to help people commit suicide, but a Bill to invest in better, local palliative care right across England and Wales.’

He renewed calls for Christians to write to their MPs and urging them to vote against this Bill.