Dr Gordon Macdonald, CEO of Care Not Killing, responds to the Third Reading vote in the House of Common in which legislation legalising assisted suicide passed by a narrow majority of 314 votes to 291:
This is a deeply flawed and dangerous Bill that since November has been made considerably worse with important safeguards watered down or scrapped. Take the proposal for the High Court to oversee each application as part of a formal judicial process – something sold to the public as making the Bill the ‘safest in the world'.
Now an opaque informal panel, will review applications, chosen from those with a predisposition in favour of assisted suicide as most medics and psychiatrists will refuse to take part. Importantly the panel will not have the power to compel witnesses like a court, do not have to speak to the applicant, the applicant’s loved ones or even the family doctor.
But this is the problem when legislation is rushed for ideological reasons. Indeed, during the Report Stage, MPs had under 10 hours to consider over 130 amendments to the Bill, or less than 5 minutes per change. Does anyone think this is enough time to consider changes to a draft law that quite literally is a matter of life and death?
The current Bill fails to protect vulnerable and disabled people from coercion. This is not hyperbole but based on what happens in the US state of Oregon, the model for this law. There, a majority of those who have ended their lives in recent years cite fear of being a burden on their families, carers or finances as a reason. While that law has been expanded and extended several times. Worryingly ‘terminal’ now includes eating disorders such as anorexia and even insulin dependent diabetes.
And while MPs are focused on debating assisted suicide, they are not focusing on palliative and end of life care which is crisis in our country. One in four people who would benefit from palliative care can’t access it and our amazing hospices, are so short of cash that 20 per cent of them have cut services or staff. This is what we should be talking about. We need much more care, not killing.
