I will be voting against the private members bill on assisted dying. This is not a decision I have taken lightly and I am truly grateful to everyone who has taken the time to contact me about this subject.
Since this bill was brought to Parliament, I have received extensive correspondence from my constituents on this matter – both for and against. Many of those letters and emails spoke of the direct personal experience of those constituents either as patients or their loved ones and carers. I have also listened to the views of medical professionals, especially those involved in providing palliative care to the terminally ill and their expertise has been crucial in reaching the decision that I have.
At the second reading of the bill in November last year I recorded an “active” abstention by voting both for and against the bill to give the bill the chance for further scrutiny which it now has had.
Creating a legal framework within which terminally ill patients may be given assistance to end their lives represents a seismic shift in how we approach end of life care not only in relation to those patients, but also the rights and duties of the medical community to enable this to happen.
It cannot be done without the most stringent safeguards in place to ensure patients make such decisions with all possible understanding of their conditions and the availability of and options for palliative care. There must also be protections for those who are especially vulnerable due to existing disability or mental health conditions.
I remain concerned about coercion. We all know people who believe they are a ‘burden’ to their families when they become ill and frail and require high levels of care. I fear that these people could be coerced into ‘doing the right thing’ for their family by choosing to end their life. I fear that it would be impossible to detect this. The Bill currently allows doctors to suggest assisted dying to a patient who has not raised it themselves. This presents a serious risk that terminally ill patients, already highly vulnerable, will feel pressured into ending their lives sooner than they wish to.
We know that palliative care access is worse in deprived areas, I fear that without concrete measures assisted dying could become de facto option for socioeconomically disadvantaged patients who cannot afford the high quality palliative care we all deserve.
If loved ones really feel like a burden they can choose to have assisted dying without informing their loved ones of their choice. An amendment was rejected that would have ensured families are informed before an assisted death. The bill allows individuals to die without their loved ones’ knowledge and leaving families to face this devastating loss only when collecting the body.
When people speak in favour of this bill they tell me about horrific examples of people dying in pain and how at that moment they wanted to end their loved ones suffering. This bill as written would not give people who decided in their last few days the opportunity to end their life. If someone chose in their final few days to end their life there would not be the time to go through the committee process to seek approval, they may no longer be able to take medications orally and may not have capacity to make such a decision.
My conversations with the medical community also led me to believe that some patients the bill was designed to help, such as those with late stage Motor Neurone Disease and other neurological conditions might be physically incapable of accessing the means necessary to end their lives. Assisted dying rather than euthanasia means that giving an injection through the vein is not an option.
If patients with these conditions wanted to end their life they would have to choose to do so earlier and it would be difficult to assess that they were in their last six months which is a requirement of the bill. DWP data shows 20% of patients given a “six-month terminal” prognosis live three years or longer. It is not clear how the bill will prevent irreversible deaths based on incorrect predictions.
I do not believe that the conversation about end-of-life rights and the care we provide will or should end here. Most especially I wish to see more investment in the provision of hospice and palliative care so that everyone can face the end of their lives knowing their final days can be spent with dignity and without undue suffering.