Sinister plotting to derail landmark assisted dying legislation would be a disservice to Britain, a senior Tory MP said.
Concern is mounting that gerrymandering MPs could conspire to scupper an historic victory that has given those living with terminal illnesses the right to die.
On Friday, lawmakers took a giant first step towards legalising assisted dying, supporting the second reading of Kim Leadbeater’s Private Members’ Bill by 330 votes to 275.
But a number of those who backed it could change their minds and vote against it before a law change.
But Tory grandee Kit Malthouse warned: “Given that we are contemplating profound human suffering it would be completely inappropriate for debate to be stifled using procedural manoeuvring.
“There is strong public support for Parliament to find a way for us to achieve what people facing a terminal and painful ending tell us they want, time and again, and at the same time protect those groups that need protecting.
“Friday showed that everybody played it straight, there was no attempt at trickery or game-playing, and that was recognition on both sides of the argument that there are passionately held views that need to be ventilated and we would be doing great disservice [if they were not]. We needed to have a debate and make a decision.”
Labour MP Ms Leadbeater, sister of Jo Cox who was murdered in 2016 in Batley and Spen where she had been due to hold a constituency surgery, will now appoint a committee of MPs to scrutinise the legislation. She has promised to include opponents on the committee.
Her Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill seeks to give legal protection to adults expected to die within six months who seek help to end their life provided two doctors and a High Court judge verify they are eligible and the decision has been made voluntarily. It requires those who want the right to die to over 18, resident in England and Wales and registered with a GP for at least 12-months, and have the mental capacity to make a “clear, settled and informed” wish, free from coercion or pressure.
The landmark victory was secured after passionate campaigning by terminally ill Dame Esther Rantzen, 84, who was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer in January last year.
As things stand Dame Esther, who founded ChildLine, Britain’s first around-the-clock telephone helpline for vulnerable children in 1986 and The Silver Line, a 24/7 service for lonely and isolated OAPs in 2013, is banned from ending her life in the comfort of the New Forest home she once shared with her beloved late husband Desmond Wilcox, who died a “slow and painful death” from heart disease in 2000.
She is being kept alive by “miracle drugs”, but arcane and outdated laws forced her to join Swiss suicide clinic Dignitas to where she might “buzz off” if her cancer progresses.
Current laws potentially make her three children Rebecca, Miriam and Joshua, accessories to murder if they were to accompany her on her final journey and facing 14-year jail sentences. It also prevents the national treasure from spending her final days and hours hugging and holding her five beloved grandchildren Benji, nine, Xander and Teddy, seven, and Florence and Romilly, four.
Assisted dying is banned in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
In Scotland, it is not a specific criminal offence but assisting someone’s death can leave a person who does so open to murder or other charges.
New Zealand and some American states have legalised the right to die, while earlier this year Ecuador and Columbia voted in favour.
Before Friday the last time MPs had the chance to debate the issue came in 2015, but they voted against reform in a vote lost by 330 to 118.
Great British Bake Off judge Dame Prue Leith, 84, passionately supports reform after watching her brother David die of bone cancer in 2012, saying: “Doing nothing represents a gross abdication of responsibility. There is an inequity at the heart of this debate. If you don’t want an assisted death, you don’t need to have one – you get to have your choice. But I don’t get mine.”
Her son, Tory MP Danny Kruger, has led opposition to reform, saying: “The responsibility lies with Parliament to ensure that only a Bill with adequate safeguards passes into law.”
Davina Hehir, deputy chief executive of Dignity in Dying, said: “The vast majority of the British public are behind Dame Esther’s calls for an assisted dying law that is fair and compassionate, and MPs are finally catching up to this issue.”
