Assisted suicide bill

[genandtonic]

ive popped this on Scotsnet as well, so apologies. I just wanted to raise awareness to anyone here that is in Scotland.
im not the most clever political person in the world, so apologies if I’ve got this wrong, but whether you believe in this bill or not, this seems a tad concerning given the Scottish governments current level s of nuttiness.

I got sent this from the righttolife oraganisation whether or not you agree with all of their views ( I don’t) I am glad they, and other groups are concerned about this.
given that the Scottish government don’t seem the most inspiring I’m a little concerned. They appear to be taking the English view and making it more extreme? I haven’t read it in depth so would appreciate anyone who knows more about these things adding to the thread.
It seems to have been debated 10 years ago and was voted out at that time.
now it is being proposed by …’MSP Liam McArthur (Scottish Liberal Democrat, Orkney) has lodged proposals for an Assisted Dying Scotland Members Bill. The Stage One debate and vote will take place on 13th May’

right to life news says..’Scotland’s Health, Social Care and Sport Committee directly identified a large number of major flaws with the Bill in its Stage 1 report, and made it clear that dozens of major structural changes need to be made to the Bill, should it pass Stage 1. ’
heres a link to the main article from right to life
https://righttolife.org.uk/news/scottish-health-committee-raises-over-30-concerns-with-proposed-assisted-suicide-law
and one from the bbc
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c98gzyr678eo
It seems there are many additions to the bill here in Scotland that aren’t in England and wakes. It would be very useful, I suspect, to write to your MP . There is a template at the end of the right to life link.
anyway, FYI in case it’s of interest. (And you are probably all already super informed and ahead of me)

Dear x
We are now just 6 days away from the Stage One vote on the Scottish McArthur assisted suicide Bill – it’s happening this coming Tuesday, 13 May.
Between now and then, I’ll be in touch a little more often regarding the Scottish Bill. Please do keep opening my emails and, most importantly, take the actions I highlight (usually at the end of each message). Every single one makes a difference.
U-TURN
You might have seen that Liam McArthur has just made a last-minute change to his Bill, raising the eligibility age from 16 to 18. It’s likely he did this because he knows support for the Bill is on a knife-edge.
While this truly disturbing aspect of the proposed law has been changed, despite this U-turn, this still remains a dangerous Bill. If passed, it would put thousands of vulnerable people at risk.
TAKE THIS NEW 30-SECOND ACTION TODAY
The disability rights group, Not Dead Yet UK, is asking people to contact their MSPs using a new tool on their website. It explains exactly why this Bill would be a disaster for people with disabilities.
Even if you have contacted your MSPs already, it’s really important to contact your MSPs again using this new tool – so your MSPs hear specifically about the serious risks this Bill poses to people with disabilities.
Please take action now and click the button below to use their tool to contact your MSPs. It only takes 30 seconds.
Act now - Click here to contact your MSPs
Thank you so much for all your help on this.
I’ll be in touch again soon.
With best wishes,
Catherine Robinson
Right To Life UK

I think people do understand that. How many of us don't have a close relative who has died of cancer? How many of us don't worry about dying that way ourselves?
But once the law is introduced, the hard work has been done. The concept becomes acceptable. It will then very probably in my view be extended from people who are expected to die within 6 months to people who have a terminal illness, and then to people who don't have a terminal illness but are in pain, and then to people who don't have any physical pain but have a mental illness. And to people who are disabled and can't afford the disability adjustments or treatment they need and can't get state assistance. At some point in that line of events, it will be extended to children.
In Canada the law is seen as "progressive" and has developed at great speed. The law will cover people with a (non-terminal) mental illness from next year. In 2023, 7.4% of deaths in Quebec were assisted suicide. It's often suggested to people as a good idea.
I remember a case in Belgium where a young woman of about 20 suffered from PTSD after seeing the aftermath of a bomb going off in an airport. She was otherwise completely healthy. She was accepted for assisted suicide.

And let's not forget that in Scotland thousands of elderly people died when Nicola Sturgeon told hospitals to send Covid sufferers back to their care homes, in the knowledge that they would infect the other care home residents. That must have saved a lot of money.
Scottish ministers failed to visit any care homes during two years of Covid pandemic - Daily Record

I’m pretty sure I read that Esther is planning to go to Dignitas when the time comes?

The assisted dying bill raises profound ethical questions that deserve careful and open debate. My concern is that, rather than strengthening investment in high-quality palliative care and support, it risks creating a pathway where those who are already vulnerable—whether through illness, financial hardship, or isolation—may feel an unspoken pressure to choose death.

In countries such as Canada, there have been widely reported cases that prompt difficult questions about how safeguards are applied in practice, and whether eligibility criteria can gradually expand over time. While these policies are often framed with compassion and autonomy in mind, it is essential that we examine their real-world implications with clarity and honesty.

This is not simply a medical issue, but a societal one. We should be asking whether enough is being done to ensure that people facing suffering are supported, valued, and given genuine alternatives—rather than feeling that their lives have become a burden.

I am relieved it has not passed.

MAiD in Canada seems dystopian. You need the agreement of two physicians (I believe) but you can shop round until you find them. I think there's at least one who's hung their shingle up as being a go to person for getting the boxes ticked if you want to die. Disabled people say they've been asked if they've considered MAiD when asking for help, like a wheelchair ramp. In other cases people have asked for MAiD not because they wanted to die but because they couldn't access the help that would make their lives liveable.

I don't believe most of the politicians who legalised MAiD foresaw this situation. In fact I'd be willing to bet more than one will have voiced regret that they ever voted for it.

Scotland is not Canada but there's no reason to believe it wouldn't go down the same road as everywhere else that has legalised this.

As I put in my previous post, I'm not against legalising assisted suicide. It is inhumane to prolong the lives of people who are hopelessly suffering. There have to be safeguards though, which this attempt seems to have been lacking.

I'm not sure how that means others aren't involved or implicated. It really isn't particularly different if Joan asks me to shoot her and I do, or if she asks me to hand her a gun so she can shoot herself, and I do. I am involved either way.

Some countries with legalised assisted dying and/or euthanasia have had to put in place PTSD counselling for both the medics assisting and relatives witnessing the deaths of their relatives.

Remembering that the Scottish bill banned medical staff from opting out of providing death.

Any safeguards put in place would be chipped away at. The world is becoming a more difficult place. Old, ill and disabled people dying early saves a lot of money for the state and there are obvious advantages for their relatives. Think of all those people who are waiting for their parents to die so that they can inherit. And then they see their parents spending "their inheritance" on care homes or medical treatment. Unfortunately the people whom old people trust most are the people who benefit from their death.

And that includes the state.

I was very severely depressed throughout my teens and most of my 20s, to the point that I would regularly beg my mother to kill me. I'm still not really content with life but I'm able to feel small amounts of pleasure here and there, whether that be from good food/music/whatever.
I used to be fully onboard with assisted dying. But, considering how things have developed in other countries, I have no faith at all that it would remain limited to those who are already close to the end of their life. I know that if I had lived in a country with laws like the Netherlands or Belgium when I was younger, I wouldn't be here right now.
If I ever get the the point where life feels unbearable again, I've already done the research on suicide methods and have narrowed it down to two options that seem like they would be relatively reliable and painless. The only occasion where I think I would ask someone for help is if I was quadriplegic and could not possibly do it myself. Even then I understand that would be quite a burden to put on someone else though.

I was extremely relieved that the Bill was rejected.

One of the most shocking things I heard was one of the politicians supporting the Bill asserting that in all the countries where assisted dying was legal it was not abused, otherwise therewould have been moves to repeal the legislation. Either he was very ill informed or being deliberately misleading because I have heard of some of the shocking cases in Canada where pressure has been put on people to end their own lives.

I have no faith whatsoever that vulnerable people here in Scotland wouldn't be coerced into ending their own lives.

These two articles on the situation in Canada really opened my eyes to the reality of what happens when this is legalized.

https://www.thefp.com/p/determined-to-die

https://www.thefp.com/p/death-in-one-day-inside-canadas-assisted

I have always been supportive of assisted dying for people who are terminally ill and in extreme pain. But the Canadian law includes all sorts of people who are not actually dying, and 16,499 people in one year (2024, the last year with data) seems crazy high. And that number will only get bigger because, as of next year, Canada will open up eligibility to people whose only diagnosis is a mental illness, which I believe is an absolutely terrible idea.

And this part in the first article nearly stopped my heart:

"A parliamentary committee has recommended studying whether to extend MAiD eligibility to “mature minors,” Canadians who are younger than 18 but deemed capable of making their own medical decisions."

"Mature minors" in BC are allowed to make medical decisions without parental consent because of the Infants Act. As a parent living in Canada, this scares me so much. I already have to be hypervigilant because the act includes medical gender transition treatments. Now Canada is well on its way to helping kids with only mental heath issues end their lives without their parents being involved! Dystopian indeed.

The more cynical side of me also wonders how all these governments can think it's a good idea to implement these super lax assisted dying laws that include young people with no physical issues when they are simultaneously freaking out about low birthrates and the inability of the next generation of workers to pay for older generations' retirement benefits. I don't know about the countries in Europe that have these lax laws, but if these articles are to be believed, many doctors in Canada are suggesting MAID as a treatment option very quickly, and some are performing it the same day that someone asks for it. If that attitude extends to kids suffering from depression or anxiety or whatnot, we are in big trouble.

Here's an archive link for the first article

https://archive.ph/U6luX

I knew Ellen Wiebe would be involved. She's killed more people than Shipman. I think she's trying to beat malaria.

"Mature minors" in BC are allowed to make medical decisions without parental consent because of the Infants Act. As a parent living in Canada, this scares me so much. I already have to be hypervigilant because the act includes medical gender transition treatments. Now Canada is well on its way to helping kids with onlymental heath issues end their lives without their parents being involved! Dystopian indeed.

The UNCRC (Scotland) Act could do the same here. I remember in committee there was talk of under 16s being able to end their own life without parents knowing. I think they increased to to 16 and over but I am not sure, but I can certainly see UNCRC being used that way.

I agree with what you're saying but why does it have to be one or the other?

Why can't we have both better palliative care for those that don't agree with assisted suicide AND the option of assisted suicide for those that do agree with it.

As someone that suffers with a chronic, life limiting disease, I am utterly distraught that it didn't pass.

I don't agree that the MP's got to cast the vote. It should have been put to the public. Under 150 bias people do not get to decide for over 6 million of us.

I don't agree that the MP's got to cast the vote. It should have been put to the public. Under 150 bias people do not get to decide for over 6 million of us.

We elect politicians to be our representatives, not to represent us. That is an important distinction that an awful lot of people seem confused by.

Why just this issue go to referendum? Why not GRR Act? Greyhound racing? The Notbuyable bill? Should men have had a say via a referendum over whether women should be denied a same sex forensic examiner following gang rape? How would you ensure a fair public debate when the pro-Assisted suicide lobby have multimillion dollar backing and insisted on the use of the euphemism ‘assisted dying’ which many confuse with palliative care? When we have seen lobbyists repeatedly lie eg about safeguards or say it is about suffering when suffering is not even mentioned?

Assisted suicide is there for people who can no longer physically kill themselves. If you're against assisted suicide I suppose we should make all suicide illegal again?

And yet there have been two referendums about governance.

This issue has been a free vote (and the same in Westminster), so if you voted for a particular party, you would have no idea what their position was on the matter.

You want to force all doctors to be required to kill their patients if the patient requests it? Regardless of that doctor’s beliefs, conscience, or understanding about how many hours it takes the drugs to cause death and even their unreliability in doing so? And you will require all doctors to stand by as you take hours to die from those drugs? Something that has led to them suffering PTSD in other countries (and a death row image in the US choosing firing squad over the drugs)?

You vote for individuals, not parties in WM. But the lack of understanding of the position of parties comes from the attempt to push this through as private members bills - a process that means this hugely difficult issue was subject to far less interrogation and no public consultation. It has resulted in two terrible bills being proposed. No party had this in their manifesto so no one voted for it - why do you think that was?

The popularity of assisted suicide in practice in Canada demonstrates why we should support it here. It is not illegal to commit suicide in the UK regardless of the reason, so why should it be illegal getting some help. In Canada many people have chosen to end their lives and exercised their right to choose. The sooner people have that right in the UK, the better.

But I don’t want palliative care when it comes to my time. I want the right to choose.

People in Canada choose MAiD because they because they are lacking housing, because it is winter and they are impacted by seasonable affective disorder, because they fear being a burden…

If someone is suicidal here we offer mental health support. Are you saying we should push them all off a cliff instead?

I’m very glad that it hasn’t been successful. Last year I read an article on what has happened in Canada and it’s terrifying. Apart from the fact I wouldn’t trust any government to monitor anything properly. What we need is much better palliative care.

Palliative care just means a cure is not possible, so the symptoms are treated instead. Would you really turn down palliative care when it could mean you could live a happy pain-free life for years?