Over 200 amendments to Britain’s Assisted Suicide Bill have been tabled by experts, clinicians, and medical organisations. It comes as the Bill’s Committee today rejected an amendment by Labour MP Rachael Maskell which would require someone to have a consultation on palliative care options before being able to avail of assisted suicide.
The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill passed its second reading in the House of Commons on 29 November 2024, with a Committee scrutinising the Bill meeting earlier this month. A number of key concerns have emerged during the line-by-line scrutiny, with MPs from Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party raising a number of concerns relating to whether the Mental Capacity Act would be suitable for determining whether someone can make the decision for assisted suicide.
This week, it emerged that MPs are to scrap the requirement for a high court judge to sign off on assisted dying cases amid mounting concerns over the legislation, with an expert panel to scrutinise decisions instead.
Former Director of Legislative Affairs at 10 Downing Street, Nikki da Costa, said that the number of amendments proposed evidenced a “lack of pre-legislative consultation, policy formation and testing made real.”
Liberal Democrat MP Tom Gordon recently proposed an amendment to the Bill to allow people with neurodegenerative illnesses to request assisted suicide when they have 12 months left to live – despite the fact MPs voted on the Bill on the basis that the terminally ill adult have an expected 6 months to live.
“The neurological diseases come with the very high risk of a cognitive decline in the later stages,” Gordon said.
“This means that very often, within the last six months of their lives, people with neuro illnesses, with brain illnesses, become ineligible for an assisted death.
“And they are some of the people who need an assisted death perhaps the most, the people who, for decades now, have gone to court begging for help from the system.”
Some of the amendments proposed are geared at widening access, however the majority are attempts to make the Bill safer for patients.
Some of the amendments have been proposed multiple times, and come from a range of organisations including the British Medical Association, the British Geriatrics Society, and the Medical Defence Union.
Others who have tabled amendments include Dr Alexandra Mullock, a Senior Lecturer in Medical Law and supporter of the Bill. Dr Mullock previously asked: “What happens if the procedure doesn’t work quickly?” She previously spoke about the “very rare” risk that the patient may regain consciousness and not die. “It’s incredibly rare but patients should be informed about that risk,” Mullock added.
“It’s not practical for doctors to remain for people for three to four days […] whatever approach, clinically, that is taken, needs to make sure that the risks are minimal.”
Dr Jonathan Buckley, Consultant in General Adult Psychiatry, is also among those to have submitted amendments, along with bioethicist, Dr Toni Saad, Specialty Registrar in Neurology, and Prof Anthony Bell, neurosurgeon, University of London, and Prof David Albert Jones. Dr Jones, who is a professor of bioethics at St Mary’s University College, Twickenham, recently argued in the Times Newspaper that some of the oral evidence received by the Bill committee had “not only been rushed, but some of it has also been misleading.”
He argued against the idea that “voluntary assisted dying” functions as a form of suicide prevention,” noting that since the change in the law in New South Wales in December 2023, suicide had increased by 2 per cent, and among those 65 and over, it had increased by 11 per cent.
Prof Jones wrote: “This data is in line with earlier studies from Victoria and from other jurisdictions in other countries. The Australian evidence is not reassuring. Legalising assisted suicide does not reduce – and can encourage – non-assisted suicide.”
On Tuesday, Conservative MP Danny Kruger highlighted the “value of good palliative care,” saying that he was “astonished” that members of the Committee would vote down the amendment. He said rejecting the amendment would send a message that “this is not a fork in the road – it’s a one way street.”
Prof Katherine Sleeman, an Honorary Consultant in Palliative Medicine at King’s College Hospital, said on Tuesday that she was “beyond shocked” that the committee voted against the amendment requiring a consultation on palliative care options.