Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill [HL]

My Lords, I agree with what the noble Baroness, Lady Flather, has just said. Seven months ago, when we first debated this Bill, or something very like it, I was taken aback by the number of people who were against it. I was aware, of course, that the Church and people of other faiths were likely to oppose it. If you believe that God, and only God, has the right to decide issues of life and death, it is unlikely that any counterarguments will get you to change your mind. But I could not understand, and maybe this was my own naivety, why so many people were opposing the Bill on very different grounds—in most cases, professional or emotional grounds that had nothing to do with what the Bill was actually saying. We have heard much evidence of that in the debate today so far. Supporters of the Bill, such as myself, no longer use such words as ““euthanasia”” or ““assisted suicide”” because they trigger subliminal fears and emotions in the hearts of our opponents. We have heard evidence of that today, particularly from the noble Lord, Lord Brennan. They seem to have a vision of a world in which ill people are systematically and quietly put to sleep in nursing homes, where would-be Dr Shipmans have licence to kill, the present trust that now exists between doctor and patient is broken and where the infirm and handicapped will feel constantly under threat. More moderate opponents of the Bill fear that it will encourage doctors to break the Hippocratic oath, that vulnerable old people will be cajoled into wanting to have themselves put down and that the Bill will only confirm them in their belief that they are second-class citizens and that their lives have become useless. How do so many people read so much of this into the Bill, when in most cases it seeks to achieve exactly the opposite? Far from encouraging people to end their lives, it proposes that they first consider all other possibilities, especially palliative care, before requesting any form of assisted dying. It is this ““slippery slope”” argument that opponents have got firmly implanted in their heads which fuels all these irrational fears and distorts the true intentions of this Bill. In one sense, the Bill is very straightforward. It has one simple, driving objective: to enable a person who is suffering from a terminal illness to be allowed assistance, at his own request, to end his own life, in his own time and with dignity as he sees it, and to ensure that anyone who helps him in that endeavour—including the doctor who provides the lethal dose—is free from prosecution. We should remember that no one is obliged to help the patient if it goes against his conscience. There is no slippery slope, no secret agenda, no opening of the floodgates to a general legalisation of euthanasia. The Bill applies only to people who are in their right mind and who actively, consistently and unambiguously state that they wish to end their own lives. It does not apply to people who might be considering suicide, those suffering from clinical depression or those whose families are persuaded that it might be convenient if they died. It does not apply to vulnerable old ladies who think they have become a nuisance. It does not apply to anyone, however ill or handicapped, who wishes to live their life to the full. The Bill has nothing to do with being second-class citizens, or being regarded as worthless or with one life being of more or less value than another. It applies only to those who crave, who beg or who demand assistance to bring their lives to an end. Of course a Bill like this needs safeguards against abuse. I believe such safeguards already exist within the Bill—they have been clearly emphasised by my noble friend Lord Goodhart—but if still greater safeguards are deemed necessary, let them be considered in Committee. To me, the Bill represents a way to end unnecessary suffering. It is a matter of personal choice. It is only you, the patient, who will have the right to decide that your condition has become so unbearable, and your future so bleak, that you wish to end your own life. Not your doctors, not your family, nor—dare I say it?—the Church; only you can make the decision. It may well be that the emotional pain will be greater than the physical pain when it comes to making your choice. The onus is no longer on the doctors, and that can surely only help, not damage, the doctor-patient relationship. The sincere and considered desire of a terminally ill patient to be allowed to die should be a human right. Surely, and I address this to the right reverend Prelates in particular, God gave us free will. Why does God deny us that free will when it comes to the approach of death? Why does the Church condone the continuance of unnecessary suffering? Few of us know what the cause of our death may be. Surely, however, it must be a comfort to all of us, certainly not a threat, to know that we have some say in the manner of our own dying. It is that human right which I would like to see established in future laws.