As members of the Scottish parliament begin the process of assessing amendments to the controversial assisted suicide bill, campaigners have raised concerns, not just about the core issue at stake, but at a whole host of related problems.
Both Holyrood and Westminster are in the process of considering legislation that would make medically assisted suicide law.
In Westminster the bill is currently in the House of Lords, while in Scotland, a separate bill will this week have 287 proposed amendments examined in committee.
Critics have pointed out that the current proposed schedule requires getting through all amendments in just three weeks, a logistical challenge heightened by the fact that there will only be one session per week.
Aside from the highly contested ethics of allowing doctors to kill their patients, there are other concerns attached to the legislation impacting on finances and even freedom of speech.
The Scottish government has stated that the proposed bill “significantly underestimates the costs associated with implementation” and that, should it become law, there would have to be “a degree of [funding] reprioritisation" that "would inevitably have implications for other [health] services”.
There are also concerns that the bill could be used to stifle free speech in Scotland.
One of the proposed amendments seeks to introduce “safe access zones” apparently modelled on the controversial abortion buffer zones pioneered in Scotland.
Such a zone would penalise anyone attempting to prevent or even to influence a person seeking to end their own lives. Potentially every GP surgery, hospital and care home in Scotland could become such a zone.
One Scottish grandmother, Rose Docherty, has already been arrested multiple times for standing in an abortion zone with a sign saying “Coercion is a crime, here to talk, only if you want.”
Care Not Killing, which opposes assisted suicide, said that those in favour of the bill were “seeking to gag people who might talk others out of ending their own lives”.
The group added that should assisted suicide become legal, it would only become normalised and more frequent. As evidence Care Not Killing cited Victoria, Australia, where attempts are being made to remove a regulation that prevents medical professional from first raising suicide as an option with patients.
Further evidence was provided in the form of the Netherlands, where assisted suicide has been legal for some time. The D66 party, which topped recent elections in the country, have suggested removing euthanasia from the criminal law and making access to assisted suicide a part of the country’s constitution.
