Health Secretary Wes Streeting recently announced his reasons for deciding to vote against Kim Leadbetter’s Assisted Dying Bill.
I don’t mind his being against assisted dying on principle – that’s his right – but the reason he gave was frankly, ill-informed and unhelpful to the debate.
His argument that we should not proceed with assisted dying until palliative care is fully established flies in the face of the recent Health and Social Care Select Committee report (2024).
It clearly stated that: ‘In the evidence we received we did not see any indications of palliative and end-of-life care deteriorating in quality or provision following the introduction of assisted dying/assisted suicide.’
In some places, the committee noted that the introduction of assisted dying had actually been linked with improvements in palliative care.
Mr Streeting’s intervention could set back the debate for another decade, were it not for the overwhelming evidence from other parts of the world where palliative care and assisted dying actively co-exist.
Medics always like to have control. It’s something that is drilled into use in training, that we’re the ones in charge and we have to make the decisions.
It can be hard to step back from that and say, ‘well actually, somebody else already wants to have a say in the decision on their life, their death’.
Medicine has limitations, particularly when we look beyond pain and symptom management to issues such as loss of choice, privacy, independence and dignity which go to the heart of us being sentient, social human beings.
I support Kim Leadbeater because I believe her Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill is based on decades of learning from jurisdictions around the world on how – and how not to – legislate for compassionate and well safeguarded assisted dying for competent people who are already coming to the end of their lives.
Of course we should increase the provision of palliative care for all those who need it, not just the lucky ones who can access it now.
But they should also have the choice to opt for an assisted death, if only to reduce the time of their suffering while dying.