Assisted Dying Bill passed by slim majority

[smallglassbottle]

https://news.sky.com/story/politics-latest-starmer-assisted-dying-trump-israel-iran-labour-12593360

It’s your choice I guess, if you find it ‘illogical’ that people like me are posting with concerns that experts in their fields are voicing too around this assisted dying legislation nationally. Like experts in domestic abuse and coercive control, just one example.

You describe your own arguments as ‘reasoning’ even though these clearly rely on some uninformed assumptions of your own about how abuse works. I don’t owe you any engagement on that. And I’ve posted links to rational concerns in this area backed up by expert opinion.

So far you haven’t brought any evidence to disprove any of this. Just your own opinions and calling me illogical. You can’t disprove these concerns because they are real and derive from evidence of problems that we already, sadly, see very commonly in society around the abuse of vulnerable people.

So your posts are just your opinion, which is fine. So you crack on with that and other people will continue to disagree with you.

And yes then it will be assumed that people that are in favour of assisted dying in the UK now are happy with vulnerable people being collateral damage in all this, if it gives relatively more privileged people a genuine choice at the end of life. Because that’s so plainly what this legislation will mean.

@CurrentHun I get that you want to have the last word, but you still didn't answer my points.

For example, when this legislation is approved, will you still only be fighting for the rights of coercive control victims who are also terminally ill not to request Assisted Dying or will you also begin fighting for their right to access Assisted Dying if they wish to? If you are genuinely concerned for their wellbeing, and not opposed to AD in principle, you will do both.

I won’t be fighting for the rights of anyone to access assisted dying at all, because I don’t find the process of assisted dying to be able to be sufficiently safeguarded for it to be safely offered.

It won't be "offered" at all. You will have to ask for it.

If you are genuinely concerned for their wellbeing, and not opposed to AD in principle, you will do both.

If you were genuinely concerned for their wellbeing, you wouldn’t support assisted dying.

Made legally available on the NHS, if you prefer.

But yes I think increasingly it will be ‘offered’. As in ‘this is another option’. It’s not going to not be talked about. And also, it has been reported by some patients to have become essentially suggested to them. Where legalised assisted dying has been introduced and then the government has widened the goalposts afterwards. Like in Canada.

So my reading of your position is that you are opposed to AD in principle, because you can't imagine any scenario where someone might make a rational decision to end their suffering by choosing their moment of death. You believe that someone would only choose this path if they were being manipulated. And if you knew someone was being prevented from choosing it by a coercive, controlling partner you would be on the side of the partner.

Hopefully you will never see a loved one go through this, or go through it yourself.

@CurrentHun and others are not assuming everyone is being coerced but even one person being coerced is one too many
There are not enough safeguards to ensure this doesn’t occur.

Individual experiences as has been noted are not the issue here because the entire country will be living with this law and it’s consequences.

Changes to the bill are such that all forms of support, to those who fall within the criteria, will be discussed but those such as palliative care must be discussed first.
Assisted dying will also be offered as an option.

"but even one person being coerced is one too many"

This is where I and others fundamentally disagree, because the suffering on the other side outweighs it.

Everyone has their own opinion on this, and the balance in the UK population and in Parliament has shifted towards approving Assisted Dying. This doesn't mean people don't care about CC victims - only that they also care about the terminally ill

No. I’ll say it again, this a strong PRACTICAL objection, not an objection to the PRINCIPLE of assisted dying. (Yes some people object to the principle too- but that’s not my argument here).

I don’t think it’s helpful for you to mischaracterise other people’s arguments- makes your own position look less trustworthy. It’s obviously possible to believe that

1. the principle of something (assisted dying) is good or neutral, AND ALSO that
2. the practical context in which that thing (assisted dying) would have to happen, makes that thing way too dangerous to legally offer.

That’s my position.

If that means assisted dying can’t happen in any of our lifetimes because human nature is what it is, then that’s what will have to happen. Not offering assisted dying because we want to protect the most vulnerable affects all of us too, We have to accept that.

Most of us would be much happier if we lived in a coercion-free world. Many would be happy if assisted dying really did promise everyone a pain free death (though the jury is out on that still if I understand it correctly) and it was legally available and in a way that ensured it was only ever a free completely choice.

But plainly we don’t live in that ideal world, we live in our all to real, flawed world, it’s highly unsafe to pretend otherwise.

It is sad that accepting that fact of reality places everyone in the same position we are in currently- at the mercy of medical good or bad luck at the end of life, (as a matter of public health tho, so not always just luck- richer people tend to live in good health for longer..). It is sad that our outcomes will depend on government funding and the political system, and on the quality of palliative care available. All we can do is campaign for improvements on those things if we want a greater chance of ‘a good death’, but even with doing that there can’t be any guarantees.

It's not just a matter of a 'good death'. It's the peace of mind that comes in those final months that the choice is available.
Studies show that many more people obtain information about assisted dying or even prescriptions than actually use them. And that the psychological comfort of having the option may be as important as the actual use of it.

Sorry but that seems like an even less compelling argument for introducing it.

People who want to have assisted dying legalised as an insurance policy that they probably won’t use… do not stack up as being more important a concern for legislators than the absolute certainty of unconsenting people being coerced into legalised assisted dying. Plus reality of vulnerable people suffering even lower quality end of life care once legal assisted dying is there as the alternative to natural death.

Or those people should not stack up more importantly for legislators, I mean.

Well I'm certainly glad I live in a country where it is available should I need it and I'm glad it was available for my relative with MND. I don't understand wanting to prolong peoples suffering or make them face fears of extended suffering in their final months.

Neither do I.

What you don't seem to understand, and this is what makes the argument largely futile, is that we are arguing about different things. This will be used and abused by the State to finish off people before their time, because the safeguards are not in place to stop this happening.

Just like abortion, it starts with good intention then the rules bend and get relaxed.
Babies, old, ill people can all die. Only place to be safe from forced dying is a murderer in prison. No death penalty for them.

People who are this paranoid ⬆️ will never be convinced.

Thankfully, we live in a democracy, and they are outnumbered by rational people.

Exactly. Soon there will be cries of at any age for any reason. It's very frightening.

In Canada they have extended it to be offered to prisoners. Only with terminal conditions though.

Hardly. The current bill isn’t rational and rational beings will see how similar policies have been watered down in other countries. Rational beings look beyond personal wants and needs to reflect on ‘what could be’ in the future.

Hmm

(Trigger warning ⚠️ etc)

https://nitter.net/kimleadbeater/status/1978564050603716839#m

"Hmm" seems an appropriate response, @Lalgarh, and sometimes I really do wonder about Ms Leadbeater's mindset and motivations

Perhaps it's no bad thing that the Lords appear to be throwing a spanner in the works of this horror ...

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/nov/13/peers-will-mount-fresh-offensive-to-halt-assisted-dying-bill

Is she nuts?! She needs to make up her damn mind what she wants, unless she's just trolling or taking the piss.

Is she nuts?!

Who can say, @smallglassbottle?

She certainly appears to be very dangerous, and personally I'm extremely glad there are at least some prepared to ask the hard questions