TOM HARRIS: Better to have no law change than be saddled with another bad one
It is rare for our politicians to be invited to cast a vote on a subject as profound as life and death.
But today, Scotland's MSPs will do just that, deciding whether a Bill to allow assisted dying will progress through parliament.
It is a subject that has already created bitter divisions in England, with the House of Commons scrutinising a private members' Bill that is due to return to the floor of the House shortly.
For decades various charities and pressure groups have demanded a review of existing law which prohibits terminally ill people seeking to end their lives – and their suffering – prematurely.
Those desperate enough and wealthy enough have occasionally gone abroad to jurisdictions like Switzerland where the state allows adults to seek to end their own lives. But to attempt to do so anywhere in the UK risks prosecution and jail.
Among those Scots who feel strongly about the issue one way or the other, tensions are high as the initial vote at Holyrood draws nearer.
For some, the right to end one's own life, especially when illness has drastically lowered your quality of life, is a human right, one that is necessary to a dignified death as well as life.
For opponents, any change in the law would fundamentally change the relationship between the state and the citizen, and in particular the relationship between the medical profession and a patient.
They fear that Scotland could well end up allowing those without long-term physical conditions – for example, those with mental illnesses such as depression – to choose to die. And they have warned that older people in need of long-term care could feel pressured to choose the 'easy way out' for the sake of their family, rather than endure years of palliative care.
It is not a debate that can have any morally robust conclusion, other than a legislative one that angers as many as it satisfies. As an MP I opposed changing the law, but it would be wrong to say that I felt particularly strongly about the topic, recognising that there were strong and sincerely-held opinions on either side of the debate.
Ultimately, I listened to the advice of colleagues and friends. The late David Cairns, who, despite having been ordained as a Roman Catholic priest before becoming the MP for Inverclyde, never allowed his faith to dictate policy, told me that he did not believe in the 'slippery slope' theory of politics, except in this one case. I agreed with him.
This is the greatest concern for many who oppose the current attempt to legislate. Who is to say that once this massive change in the law is made, further, incremental changes might not be made to expand the scope of the legislation?
Why must you be suffering from a terminal condition to access assisted dying? After all, a permanent, agonising condition, mental or physical, that is not life-threatening is, arguably, less tolerable than a terminal condition.
And where does that lead any society?
But those on the other side of the debate are similarly sincere and have at their disposal a number of strong arguments too.
Tales of dreadfully ill, pain-infused family members and friends who desperately want to end it all can hardly fail to elicit the sympathy of even the most hard-headed opponents of the right to die.
And so the debate will continue, whatever happens at Holyrood today. My own view, that the top of that slippery slope is perilously close to where we would be if this Bill becomes law, has not changed, though I sympathise with those who disagree. But my concerns go further than the actual principle of this Bill.
Holyrood has proved itself to be less than competent when it comes to legislating in controversial areas.
Remember the Gender Recognition Reform Bill? The Offensive Behaviour at Football Bill? The abandoned Named Person legislation? To be frank, I do not trust our MSPs to frame legislation in such a delicate and important area.
There is a stronger case for any such legislation to be UK-wide, or at least Britain-wide. We must not institutionalise separate jurisdictions that might encourage people living on either side of the border to travel north or south to take advantage of a more lenient legal framework.
That is why drugs policy remains – and must remain – reserved to the UK parliament. That's why abortion law should have remained at Westminster, rather than being used as a political football by the Smith Commission when it was deciding which new areas of policy should be devolved to Scotland back in 2015.
Do we really want to see ill and vulnerable people encouraged to move from or to Scotland in order to seek the state's help to die? That is hardly the bright future that the advocates of devolution promised in the 1980s and '90s.
Better to have no change in law at all than to be saddled with another bad one.
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