Make assisted dying work, Starmer tells Streeting

Telegraph

5 hours ago

Sir Keir Starmer has said he will make assisted dying work, in a rebuke to his Health Secretary who claimed there was no budget for it.
Mr Streeting said at the weekend that the NHS did not offer a good enough palliative care service to provide people with choice at the end of their lives.
But Sir Keir, who voted in favour of the assisted dying legislation, said it was his responsibility as Prime Minister to make the Bill 'workable'.
In a rebuke to Mr Streeting, he said he was 'confident' the Government had done the necessary preparation.
It marks a further deepening of the Cabinet rift. Critics of Mr Streeting argue he should prepare to implement the will of Parliament, rather than making interventions against the law.
Last week the House of Commons voted narrowly to support Kim Leadbeater's Private Member's Bill, and it will now be scrutinised in the House of Lords.
The Government is officially neutral on the bill, and MPs were given a free vote, which meant they did not have to vote along party lines.
While Sir Keir is a supporter of the legislation, Mr Streeting is against it, partly on religious grounds.
The Prime Minister was asked whether the will of Parliament should be implemented and the budget found during his trip to The Hague, where he attended a Nato summit.
He replied: 'It is my responsibility to make sure the bill is workable, and that means workable in all its aspects. I'm confident we've done that preparation.'
Critics accuse the Health Secretary of breaking the spirit of the government's neutrality by speaking out so openly about his opposition.
In a lengthy message on Facebook after the Commons supported assisted dying by just 23 votes, Mr Streeting claimed that despite his opposition, he would 'make sure that we do a good job with it for the country'.
But he quoted former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown 's position that 'there is no effective freedom to choose if the alternative option... is not available', referring to sufficient end-of-life care provisions.
Mr Streeting wrote: 'The truth is that creating those conditions will take time and money.
'Even with the savings that might come from assisted dying if people take up the service – and it feels uncomfortable talking about savings in this context to be honest – setting up this service will also take time and money that is in short supply.
'There isn't a budget for this. Politics is about prioritising. It is a daily series of choices and trade-offs. I fear we've made the wrong one.'
Campaigners in favour of the bill say it will give terminally ill adults the choice on how they want to die and prevent painful deaths, but critics argue it risks people being coerced into seeking an assisted death.
The Terminally Ill Adults Bill was backed by 314 votes to 291 – a majority of 23, which was much lower than the 55 majority when the bill was first debated in November.
If the House of Lords approve the bill later this year, ministers would have a maximum of four years to implement the measures, meaning it could be 2029 before assisted dying becomes available.