MPs worried about the impact of assisted suicide

Dozens of MPs are unsure about legalising assisted suicide as concerns grow ahead of next month’s House of Commons debate.

Former Labour shadow minister Rachael Maskell told The Guardian that she has been encouraging undecided MPs to vote against Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide Bill and urge the Government to form a commission on improving palliative care.

According to the newspaper, new Labour MPs are particularly concerned that the full details of Leadbeater’s Private Member’s Bill are still yet to be published and it will only be given a maximum of five hours of debate before the vote takes place.

Rushed

Maskell, who was part of the Health and Social Care Committee’s inquiry into assisted suicide and euthanasia, said: “We haven’t even seen the bill yet and we will have five weeks and then a five-hour debate – that feels like the process isn’t right for dealing with such a sensitive and challenging subject and complex subject.”

She highlighted that “palliative care and the hospice service have been crying out for years about their underfunding”, but the assisted suicide lobby has been “very successful and persuasive in trying to advance their agenda”.

The Guardian said undecided MPs are concerned that the proposals could send a dangerous message in the absence of significant improvements to the NHS, and they have taken note that both the Health and Justice Secretary plan to vote against the Bill.

Palliative care

Last week, Health Secretary Wes Streeting told MPs that he will vote against Leadbeater’s Bill due to the unsatisfactory state of NHS palliative care.

One Labour MP at the meeting reported: “He told us he wants to get to a point where people have a real choice at the end of life. At the moment, he said he doesn’t think it’s a genuine choice because palliative care is so bad. He did explicitly say he’d be voting against the assisted dying bill. He said he voted for it last time but he’s changed his mind.”

A ministerial aide commented: “There are MPs who have doubts but are on the fence, and this would have reinforced those doubts. The justification is nothing he didn’t say in public, but this is the health secretary, you’ve got to take it seriously.”