Doctors raise concerns over assisted dying Bill ahead of return to Parliament
He told the BBC Radio Four Today programme: 'I totally understand the criticisms around the Bill but I think that actually if you read the Bill it's incredibly safe now and it has a number of safeguards around capacity and coercion and indeed that's why we've involved psychiatrists for the very difficult cases around assessing mental capacity – which are very few but we need their expertise on that level.'
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Scotsman
9 hours ago
- Scotsman
Terminally ill man behind Church of Scotland assembly on the 'really difficult' assisted dying conundrum
Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... It was a speech he never expected to make, but one that he hoped will offer insight and comfort for others living with or supporting friends and family with terminal illnesses. Now, a man who delivered a powerful address to the Church of Scotland's General Assembly about his own experience with life-limiting disease has called for a major upsurge in investment in palliative care and questioned the assisted dying legislation passing through Holyrood. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad John Williams, 71, has been undergoing dialysis treatment for the past seven years - a situation complicated by the fact he has also been diagnosed with cancer of the small bowel that has spread to his lung and spine. Such health problems have given Mr Williams cause to think deeply about assisted dying, an issue that has occupied the minds of those in the church, MSPs and wider civic Scotland in recent months. John Williams addresses the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. | Andrew O'Brien It has also made Mr Williams even more aware of the crucial and compassionate services provided by palliative care specialists, having been referred to St Columba's Hospice after being referred by Dr Tony Duffy, his palliative care consultant. Call for hospices to receive better funding package He said he wished he had been made aware of palliative care sooner, and described the resources afforded to hospices as a 'disgrace' that had to be urgently addressed. 'There just isn't the capacity there, and the number of people who die in hospices is just a tiny figure,' he said. 'The hospices are just not supported or properly funded and they need volunteers just to run things.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad As things stand, Mr Williams, who has no idea how long he has left to live, said he could not support the Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill that passed an initial vote at Holyrood last month. But he said there was an opportunity to work towards 'better' legislation provided key issues were addressed. 'How are you going to square doing this with the medical profession - how is that going to work in practice?' he said. 'I think that's the really difficult one. It's not going to be easy, whatever happens, and I honestly don't know what will come next, but there has to be detailed thought given. I'm concerned the Bill is being rushed through.' Liam McArthur's assisted dying bill is currently progressing through Holyrood. | PA The Bill, brought forward by Scottish Lib Dem, Liam McArthur, will go back to the Scottish Parliament's health committee for stage two, with a deadline for amendments in the autumn. Mr McArthur intends to bring in an amendment raising the minimum age at which people should be eligible to 18. It is expected there will be moves to impose a time limit on what is defined as a terminal diagnosis. 'Why me and not other people?' Mr Williams will be among those following the Bill's progress. There have been times where the pain has been so great that he has considered stopping dialysis, and he knows that if his cancer becomes too heavy a burden to bear, that option will remain open to him. It is an option very few people have, and Mr Williams said he found it difficult to reconcile the fact that others living with terminal illness did not have such a choice available. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'You think 'why me and not other people?' he told The Scotsman. 'I can understand people who want to go down that road. I just hope that anyone who does it does so for the right reasons, and that everything else has failed. You've got to be really, really careful as to how it's worked out and what discussions take place beforehand.' Such conversations are something Mr Williams draws strength from and, for the time being, he is hopeful that he will be able to manage his cancer and continue dialysis. 'Obviously, some people will say that God will decide when it's your time, but I think it depends on how you look at it,' he reflected. 'It's like the parable of the drowning man who refuses a lifeboat and a helicopter, and when he meets God, it's explained that it was God who sent the rescuers. 'At present, the medication I'm on is not working great, which is down to the spinal cord cancer, and I can't get radiotherapy for that. It's a case of changing the medication quite drastically. If I can keep doing that with dialysis and the cancer keeps in check, I'll keep going. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'But if nothing was working, and I found that I couldn't get anything under control, would I consider stopping dialysis? Yes, I would have to consider it, because even with palliative care, I'm going to be in trouble. But now is not the time to have that conversation.' 'Sharing your story is so valuable' Since 1974, Mr Williams has played a crucial role in the assembly, working as an audio-visual technician to ensure a phalanx of cameras, microphones and screens are fully operational so as to allow those in Edinburgh and further afield to follow the proceedings. But after more than half a century behind the scenes, Mr Williams was at the forefront of this year's gathering. Although he is not a commissioner, he was invited to address the assembly by Rev Dr John Ferguson, convener of the church's working group on assisted dying. After delivering a 14-minute speech, during which he spoke candidly about his own treatment and the plight of others, he received a rousing ovation, with Moderator Rt Rev Rosie Frew thanking him for sharing his story 'so openly and so honestly', and for helping people to understand what he was going through. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad
Powys County Times
a day ago
- Powys County Times
Home Office plans to spend £2.2bn of foreign aid on asylum support this year
The Home Office plans to spend about £2.2 billion of foreign aid to support asylum seekers this financial year, according to new figures. The amount of overseas development assistance (ODA) budgeted by the Home Office – which is largely used to cover accommodation costs such as hotels for asylum seekers – is slightly less than the £2.3 billion it spent in 2024/25. International rules allow countries to count first-year costs of supporting refugees as overseas development assistance (ODA). The figures, first reported by the BBC, were published in recent days on the Home Office website. The Home Office said it is 'urgently taking action to restore order and reduce costs' which will cut the amount spent to support asylum seekers and refugees in the UK. It also said it was expected to have saved £500 million in asylum support costs in the last financial year, and that this had saved £200 million in ODA which had been passed back to the Treasury. A total of 32,345 asylum seekers were being housed temporarily in UK hotels at the end of March this year. This figure is down 15% from the end of December, when the total was 38,079, and 6% lower than the 34,530 at the same point a year earlier. Asylum seekers and their families are housed in temporary accommodation if they are waiting for the outcome of a claim or an appeal and have been assessed as not being able to support themselves independently. They are housed in hotels if there is not enough space in accommodation provided by local authorities or other organisations. Labour has previously said it is 'committed to end the use of asylum hotels over time', adding that under the previous Conservative government at one stage 'more than 400 hotels were in use and almost £9 million per day was being spent'. Jo White, chairwoman of the Red Wall group of Labour MPs, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Saturday: 'We need to be looking at things like ECHR article eight. I don't think anything's off the table … including looking at new options such as processing abroad. 'So, we have to be open to see how we can move move that backlog as quickly as possible. I'm getting impatient. 'I know my colleagues in parliament are getting impatient and we're pressing the Government as hard as we can on this.' A Home Office spokesperson said: 'We inherited an asylum system under exceptional pressure and are urgently taking action to restore order and reduce costs. 'This will ultimately reduce the amount of official development assistance spent to support asylum seekers and refugees in the UK. 'We are immediately speeding up decisions and increasing returns so that we can end the use of hotels and save the taxpayer £4 billion by 2026. 'The Rwanda scheme also wasted £700 million to remove just four volunteers – instead, we have surged removals to nearly 30,000 since the election, are giving law enforcement new counter-terror style powers, and increasing intelligence sharing through our Border Security Command to tackle the heart of the issue, vile people-smuggling gangs.'
South Wales Argus
a day ago
- South Wales Argus
Home Office plans to spend £2.2bn of foreign aid on asylum support this year
The amount of overseas development assistance (ODA) budgeted by the Home Office – which is largely used to cover accommodation costs such as hotels for asylum seekers – is slightly less than the £2.3 billion it spent in 2024/25. International rules allow countries to count first-year costs of supporting refugees as overseas development assistance (ODA). The figures, first reported by the BBC, were published in recent days on the Home Office website. The Home Office said it is 'urgently taking action to restore order and reduce costs' which will cut the amount spent to support asylum seekers and refugees in the UK. It also said it was expected to have saved £500 million in asylum support costs in the last financial year, and that this had saved £200 million in ODA which had been passed back to the Treasury. A total of 32,345 asylum seekers were being housed temporarily in UK hotels at the end of March this year. This figure is down 15% from the end of December, when the total was 38,079, and 6% lower than the 34,530 at the same point a year earlier. Asylum seekers and their families are housed in temporary accommodation if they are waiting for the outcome of a claim or an appeal and have been assessed as not being able to support themselves independently. They are housed in hotels if there is not enough space in accommodation provided by local authorities or other organisations. Labour has previously said it is 'committed to end the use of asylum hotels over time', adding that under the previous Conservative government at one stage 'more than 400 hotels were in use and almost £9 million per day was being spent'. Jo White, chairwoman of the Red Wall group of Labour MPs, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Saturday: 'We need to be looking at things like ECHR article eight. I don't think anything's off the table … including looking at new options such as processing abroad. 'So, we have to be open to see how we can move move that backlog as quickly as possible. I'm getting impatient. 'I know my colleagues in parliament are getting impatient and we're pressing the Government as hard as we can on this.' A Home Office spokesperson said: 'We inherited an asylum system under exceptional pressure and are urgently taking action to restore order and reduce costs. 'This will ultimately reduce the amount of official development assistance spent to support asylum seekers and refugees in the UK. 'We are immediately speeding up decisions and increasing returns so that we can end the use of hotels and save the taxpayer £4 billion by 2026. 'The Rwanda scheme also wasted £700 million to remove just four volunteers – instead, we have surged removals to nearly 30,000 since the election, are giving law enforcement new counter-terror style powers, and increasing intelligence sharing through our Border Security Command to tackle the heart of the issue, vile people-smuggling gangs.'
