MP fears diabetes comes within remit of Leadbeater Bill

An MP living with type 1 diabetes has voiced concerns that her condition falls within the scope of Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide proposals.

Sarah Bool believes the definition of terminal illness in the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill is too broad and is calling for it to be amended to list diseases it includes and does not include.

The Bill, currently being scrutinised by a committee of MPs selected by Leadbeater, would allow those in England and Wales diagnosed as terminally ill, and deemed to have less than six months to live, to receive help to kill themselves.

Poorly drafted

Bool, an experienced lawyer, explained: “the way the Bill is drafted as it stands, I am caught potentially, because type 1 diabetes is a progressive illness that is not reversible by treatment. It’s something that I can only manage.

“If I stop taking treatment, and there’s no obligation for me to take it under this Bill either, then I could reasonably die within six months, and actually die much quicker.”

The Conservative MP for South Northamptonshire added: “I’ve had a lot to come to terms with and I think that’s possibly why I feel even stronger now about some of these issues because I looked and I was like, ‘well, hold on a minute. I should never come within the remit of this Bill’.”

Amendments

Former Home Secretary James Cleverly is seeking to amend Leadbeater’s proposals to “make it clear that feeling like a burden is not a reason for assisted dying and that doctors and judges should safeguard against that risk”.

He told Times Radio: “I want to make sure that the same protections that we put in place against coercion are in place for people who are doing it for what I believe are the wrong reasons, which is because they don’t want to be a burden on society rather than the reasons put forward by the proponents of the Bill.”

But writing in The Daily Telegraph, Nick Timothy MP warned: “Given the in-built majority in favour of the Bill on the committee, the only amendments that will pass – if any do at all – will be those Leadbeater and her supporters find acceptable.”