Liz Saville Roberts MP on why she backs assisted dying bill

North Wales Chronicle

9 hours ago

MPs voted 330 in favour, to 275 against, during the second reading of the bill in Parliament in November – the Report stage of the bill will resume on Friday (June 13).
Labour's Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) bill would make assisted dying legal for terminally ill adults who are expected to die within six months, and who have the mental capacity to make the choice to end their life.
It is a Private Member's Bill tabled by Kim Leadbeater MP.
Reporter Matthew Chandler spent half an hour talking to Mrs Saville Roberts about the bill.
MC: You voted in favour of the bill in November. Are you still in favour of it now?
LSR: I feel more strongly in favour of it now, because I've heard so much evidence from families who desperately felt their loved ones suffered from the lack of this facility in two ways: people suffered unduly at the end of their lives, and they lost their autonomy.
[It's about] the sheer degree of suffering, and the sense that many people feel they should have the right to decide what happens to them at the end of their lives.
MC: You were part of the bill committee. Why?
LSR: It was Kim (Leadbeater)'s decision as to who the members were; she chose a mixture of those for and against the bill.
I have spoken to Kim about some really striking issues with how this is going be brought into effect in Wales, because public health is devolved in Wales, so whenever we're taking about the NHS in the bill, that refers to England only as it stands.
We're going to have to be really alert to avoid unintended consequences if we're going to recognise the way health is operated differently between England and Wales.
MC: You have commended Kim Leadbeater for doing everything possible to strengthen scrutiny withing the constraints of the bill. Do you think ruling out using the judiciary, and instead proposing a three-member panel is strengthening scrutiny?
LSR: There is the judiciary there. Previously, it was a High Court judge alone, but we received evidence that there are different professional interpretations of the word 'capacity'. It will mean different things to different clinicians.
The point of having a High Court judge there would be to make sure the law is being followed to the letter. A High Court judge is not an expert on capacity. So, what is being brought in now is to have a senior judiciary figure, a social worker and a psychiatrist, and that brings to bear different definitions and considerations of capacity.
I think that's an immense improvement. We have to be as sure as possible that we have considered all options, and I really think that having these different profession definitions and considerations as to what capacity means improves the bill considerably.
MC: But does it not concern you that the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Royal College of Physicians have both said the bill is not fit for purpose?
LSR: They are fair to raise concerns, but the British Medical Association has moved their point of view considerably since 2015, and there will always be professional bodies bringing forward concerns whenever you bring a change in the law.
To me, the tension here lies between: do you grant the individual the right to something which I think the public now expect us to do?
Then, as legislators, we have to do our best to make sure this is as secure against abuse and misuse and unintended consequences as possible.
This is quite difficult through a Private Member's Bill, because it hasn't had the time that a government has to carry out impact assessments before they even the draft the bill.
But we have been discussing this for over 10 years. There have been iterations of this bill. It hasn't come out of nowhere.
MC: I appreciate it hasn't come out of nowhere, but there has been no royal commission on it, and the time for debate was minimal (the full text of the bill, as presented for second reading, was published on November 11; MPs then voted on it on November 29).
LSR: That's because the government hasn't taken this on.
If they had, it wouldn't have to go through the time of a Private Member's Bill, which means it has to be finished in the Commons before we rise for recess, and it has to go through the Lords before the King's speech, which will almost certainly be in the second half of October.
There is very good precedent for that to happen through Private Member's Bills. Difficult, big societal decisions, such as legalising homosexuality and abortion, have been made through Private Member's Bills, and it allows the government and opposition parties to give their members a free whip.
So, with any piece of legislation, there is a tension on time.
MC: What would you say, then, to (former Archbishop of Westminster) Cardinal Vincent Nichols, who wrote in April: 'It is a sad reflection on Parliament's priorities that the Commons spent far more time debating the ban on fox hunting than it is spending debating bringing in assisted suicide' - is that fair?
LSR: I think it says something about society that whenever anything in relation to fox hunting has come across the desk to me, the amount of correspondence about that is way higher than it will be over children in Gaza.
Again, the tension here for legislating in real time is - do you continue to make the perfect be the enemy of the good? Or, do you build in the means to change, so that legislation can be adapted as we go ahead?
If this passes in Westminster, it then has an expectation that it's implemented within four years.
MC: In 2010, two cases of assisted dying in Holland involved psychiatric suffering. In 2023, there were 138.
Also in 2023, MPs in Canada wanted to introduce assisted dying suicide for children without parental consent.
This is quite a common theme of other countries' initial scope for assisted dying widening as time passes. How can you guard against that 'slippery slope' in the UK?
LSR: I can't tell future parliamentarians what to do, that's the nature of democracy, all I can do is describe what we've done in this bill as it stands.
In this bill, mental illness alone doesn't qualify as a terminal illness and somebody has to have a terminal illness with a prognosis of six months (at most) in order to apply for the process, and you have to be over the age of 18.
MC: But do you not worry that you might be opening the floodgates?
LSR: I feel very strongly that the medical profession, since (the atrocities of) Harold Shipman, is so averse to being seen to be responsible for bringing about somebody's death prematurely, that people are suffering.
And in a society where we value autonomy and individualism, an individual adult with full capacity, no evidence of coercion, and a terminal illness, should be empowered to decide how and when their life ends.
Otherwise, I think the risk is that there is an imposition of the state in keeping people alive against their will and in great suffering.
The fear of the slippery slope is telling that individual: 'You will die in agony.' It's up to the legislation to make sure the safeguards are in place to prevent it from widening.
MC: What about members of staff who may be involved in the procedure of assisted dying, but who may face moral dilemmas themselves?
LSR: They can opt out. It's like abortion.
MC: What about the impact that it could have on the strain on the NHS? Do you not worry it could cause cuts to other NHS services if assisted dying becomes a bigger priority?
LSR: The NHS is under immense, intolerable strain. Everything about the NHS gives me concern. We are an ageing society. We have the means to do medically that which we can't afford.
At same time, to me, this comes down to a right of the individual. Either you acknowledge that the individual has a right to make these sorts of decision and enable it, or you don't.
The evidence we heard from Australia, Canada and Holland is that the vast majority of people who take this route very much value their autonomy. It isn't, in the greatest number of cases, people for whom there is a question over capacity.
You can't make a living will with this and say: 'If I get dementia, I want to go down the assisted dying route,' because the capacity will have gone.
MC: Do you feel there has been parity in the time given for voices of both sides of the argument to be heard in the debate?
LSR: Yes, because I've been on the bill committee. I have quite some sympathy for the MPs who weren't, but I think we should have sufficient time within the days that we have, which will only be Fridays, to do this.
Of course, there is a parliamentary technique of talking something out. I think that's worth being alert to, as well.
I think there is a general sense that parliamentarians would have failed as legislators if we can't bring something forward that is decent and humane.
Every piece of legislation gets corrected and improved, because society moves on, as well. But I think we are expected now to pull together something that works, rather than find reasons not to make a difficult decision because it's easier to avoid it.
We're passing on suffering to others if we do that.
MC: Do you know of any disability rights groups in support of bill?
LSR: I think there are great concerns among disability groups, because they're concerned that disabled people don't always have the respect they should have within society.
Again, this is about protecting people and making sure there are sufficient safeguards in place.
I come back to the fact that I believe this to be a fundamental right of the individual, and if they have capacity, then it is their right to make that decision.
MC: So, you believe the bill is ethical?
LSR: Yes.
This has now passed the parliamentary stage in Scotland, the Isle of Man, and Jersey, with different parameters. It is enroute to coming in in different jurisdictions of the UK and the Crown Dependencies.
MC: So, are you saying we're lagging behind?
LSR: I think the citizens of the UK will expect a degree of consistency in what their rights are as individuals.
Fundamentally, the question here is: is it right for me to tell the person next to me that because of my moral scruples, they have to suffer, possibly, a really hideous death? Or, is it their right to decide without me interfering?
This is about the right of the individual, so that the option is there; rather than an almost religious attitude, whereby it is God who gives and God who takes away, which does seem to drive some opposing lobbying groups.
MC: Are you religious?
LSR: I was raised in the Church of England/Church in Wales.
MC: Do you think the religious arguments against assisted dying are archaic, or outdated?
LSR: I think in almost every other aspect of society, we grant the individual autonomy and then, at this last stage, we row back on that.
Nobody is condoning the inadequacies of the NHS. Of course, we should be improving palliative care, of course we should be having a real debate that we are a desperately ageing society that hasn't trained enough doctors and nurses for decades.
(But) widening the individual's rights doesn't mean we tolerate the intolerable.
MC: Is legalising assisted dying more important than improving palliative care?
LSR: They're equally important. Societally, we don't like talking about death. This has made us talk about death. It's probably a good thing that we're talking about it, because death is something that affects everybody.
We will always get terminal illnesses. If a cancer is going to grow in your body until your body stops something working, that's not going to be pleasant. It's going to stop the function of your body, and it will be slow.
But when does the point come when we realise, we are unethically imposing on somebody else how we perceive we would put ourselves in their position?
MC: But don't you have to do that to an extent, because you're voting on it?
LSR: Yes - that's why I'm in favour of it. I'm not making anybody ask the state to kill them, and I'm doing my best to put the conditions in place where nobody else will be able to coerce somebody to take this route. That is the worst scenario in this, and is fundamentally wrong.
But I do think we need to question ourselves about whether I am imposing my perception of what quality of life is, to the point where I am saying: 'They can't decide their own fate'.
It's not about imposing assisted dying on someone; it's about giving them the autonomy to choose it.
Nobody should come at this lightly. Nothing gets more serious than this.
You can read more of Mrs Saville Roberts' thoughts on the bill here.