After a five-hour debate on Friday, the Commons supported Kim Leadbeater’s amendment to allow health workers to opt out of helping with assisted dying in a key change
Kim Leadbeater’s bid to legalise assisted dying took a step forward on Friday as a key change was backed by MPs.
After a five-hour debate, momentum still appeared behind the Labour MP in her attempt to allow terminally ill adults with six months left to apply to end their lives. The Commons supported Ms Leadbeater’s amendment to allow health workers to opt out of helping with assisted dying. A change put forward by an opponent to the Bill was defeated.
MPs will debate the law once again on June 13 with over 100 amendments tabled. There will then be a crunch vote on the highly sensitive issue.
The debate on Friday was the first time the proposed legislation had returned to the Commons since a historic vote in November saw a majority of MPs support the principle of assisted dying. Bringing her Bill back to Parliament, Ms Leadbeater said assisted dying must be legalised to avoid terminally ill people acting out of desperation or making “traumatic” trips to Dignitas, in Switzerland.
The Labour MP for Spen Valley said: “Put simply, if we do not vote to change the law, we are essentially saying that the status quo is acceptable. Over recent months, I have heard hundreds of stories from people who have lost loved ones in deeply difficult and traumatic circumstances, which show that that is clearly not the case.
“Too many have seen their terminally-ill loved ones take their own lives out of desperation, or make the traumatic, lonely and costly trip to Switzerland, and then face a police investigation while dealing with their grief and loss.”
On Friday grieving families watched the debate from the public gallery of the House of Commons as the Bill was debated in the chamber. Louise Shackleton, who is being investigated by police for taking her husband Anthony, 59, to Diginitas, to die in December, was among them. She has previously said Anthony, who was suffering from Motor Neurone Disease, had a “beautiful death”.
Speaking to The Mirror, she praised Labour MP Ms Leadbeater. Louise, 58, said: “I think Kim’s speech was very measured, very articulate, and she got the point of what people with a terminal illness want from an assisted death.I think she was absolutely spot-on.” But she said MPs repeatedly bringing up problems with palliative care “simply have no understanding of what someone who wants an assisted death actually wants”.
READ MORE: ‘My mum took dad to Dignitas to avoid agonising death – I’m so scared for her’
She added: “They seem to be under the impression that everyone that’s terminally ill wants to die. They’re not, they want to live. Our motor neurone community has the strongest, most amazing people, and all of them want to live. However what they don’t want, when their time comes, they do not want to suffer an appalling, grotesque death.”
The at-times emotional and impassioned debate saw supporters of changing the law argue the Bill has returned with strengthened safeguards after being amended in committee earlier this year. Ms Leadbeater’s amendment will allow medics to excuse themselves from being involved in an assisted death. Doctors already had an opt-out but the new clause extends that to anyone, including pharmacists and social care workers.
Tory MP Rebecca Paul, who sits on the bill’s committee, saw her amendment defeated. It called for employers opposed to assisted dying to be allowed to prevent their workers from providing the service. Ms Paul, who is against a change in the law, argued assisted dying “will harm far more people than it will help and those people that will be harmed are the most vulnerable in our communities”. “It really is life or death so please don’t accept anything that isn’t good enough,” she said.
During the debate, multiple MPs raised concerns that patients could “shop around” for different doctors to grant their assisted dying request if they are initially rejected for the procedure. But Ms Leadbeater assured the Commons that a report would be produced by a doctor if they felt the patient did not meet the criteria. This would then be passed onto the patient, the co-ordinating doctor and an assisted dying commissioner overseeing the case.
Other MPs said the UK’s “broken” NHS, social care and palliative care systems needing addressing before assisted dying was accepted. Opponents also complained the Bill does not have enough protections and has been rushed through. Labour MP Naz Shah claimed she did not realise her amendment ensuring better protections for those who voluntarily stop eating or drinking had been accepted until she was sitting in Parliament. She described the parliamentary process as “chaos”, adding: “We shouldn’t be playing games with people’s lives like this.”
Jess Asato, a Labour MP who opposes the bill, was among MPs to hit out at a letter from broadcaster Dame Esther Rantzen claiming that those who have concerns about the bill have “undeclared religious beliefs”.
She says she found she and her colleagues found this “distasteful and disrespectful”. The daughter of Dame Esther, who has stage four lung cancer and sparked a national conversation on assisted dying, said her mum is “terrified” her family will see her go through a “traumatic death”.
Speaking at a demonstration outside Parliament, Rebecca Wilcox said: “She’s terrified that our memories of her – and they are such good memories – will be destroyed by a bad death, and so she’s asking for choice for everybody. Unfortunately, it won’t be in time for her.”
Opponents of the bill also gathered in Westminster, including actor and disability campaigner Liz Carr. Gordon Macdonald, chief executive of Care Not Killing, said assisted dying was “really dangerous”. Once you put assisted suicide or euthanasia into medicine, which is what’s being proposed, there are lots and lots of vulnerable people at a huge risk of pressure or abuse, perhaps, by partners or, alternatively, just feeling a burden,” he said.
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