The assisted dying bill is about to die, killed off by a small coterie of peers against the will of the House of Commons and voters who have supported the right to die for decades. Can the government let this happen? Keir Starmer, who has voted in favour of the legislation, needs to summon the spirit of Harold Wilson’s 1960s reforms. He has the powers to push it through, whatever it takes.
If the Lords block this, it should be their last gasp. Their outrageous behaviour illuminates everything grotesque about the upper house. There is no telling with any certainty how the vote would go among this eclectic parade of 844 who range from good to very bad indeed, but plainly opponents of the bill think they would lose as they filibuster to prevent a vote at all. Back in the Lords tomorrow and then for seven more Fridays, at this pace there is no chance it will get through in time, unless the blockers give up immediately.
The Tories plotting against the bill are a gleeful Lords reunion of the old Brexit gang – Michael Gove, David Frost, Mark Harper and Thérèse Coffey – reprising the same dirty tricks with the same cunning. They know the loss will humiliate Labour and Starmer, who gave time for this private member’s bill. Absurdly, opponents deny this is a filibuster, but watch them tomorrow in the Lords and see them talk very slowly, making identical speeches on identical or crass amendments. Last week, they piled into the preceding debate on the agenda to waste maximum time before assisted dying came up. I’ve never seen any of them show any interest before in a bill on rare cancers, but suddenly they grew loquacious.
Some chief filibusterers, such as Ilora Finlay, are at least driven by religious belief. Tanni Grey-Thompson also fiercely opposes the bill, fearing ill treatment of those with disabilities, though research suggests a similar proportion of disabled people want the right to an assisted death as most voters. Despite never-ending negotiations and near-impossible conditions, opponents make zero compromise.
Look how tough the bill is: those within six months of dying can ask for help (only in writing) to speed their ending, from two doctors seven days apart. After another wait, a panel of a psychiatrist, social worker and senior lawyer must agree, and the patient must be able to take the drug themselves with a doctor present. Many safeguards were added, and clinicians are free not to participate. Evidence from the many countries with similar laws shows that relatively few people use it, but most approaching death are comforted to know if the agony becomes unbearable, they can choose to end it.
A reminder of what terrible deaths await the most unfortunate. (Don’t read this if you’re too squeamish to face the horrors some suffer, untreatable even by the best palliative care.) Professionals who see these things compiled a report, the Inescapable Truth, revealing agonies hidden from most of us: “Some will retch at the stench of their own body rotting. Some will vomit their own faeces. Some will suffocate, slowly, inexorably, over several days.” An average of 17 people a day are dying these bad deaths, according to 2019 figures. Good palliative care works wonders, but not always. About 650 suicides of those who are dying are recorded every year; there may be more of these lonely, unassisted deaths.
Amendments to the bill have been clumped into 84 groups. So far, only 12 have been debated, very slowly. Some are absurd beyond belief, some transparent attempts to waste time: amendment no 578 and eight others would replace “substance” with “substance and mixture”. No 458 would make every patient take a pregnancy test. No 15 bars anyone who has been abroad in the last year, so forget a bucket list. Nos 701 and 713 suggest clinical trials for the “substance” used. How do you carry out a randomised control trial on a life-ending drug?
Three-quarters of the public back the right to die, and their lordships should remember there is also strong support for radical reforms that would remove most current incumbents. The 24 bishops are a small part of the unrepresentative religious peers on the red benches in this increasingly secular country. Expect their killing of this bill to stoke demand for an end to the Lords – a demand the government should listen to.
The bill will die in mid-May, at the end of this parliament. The government could use the Parliament Act to force it through without the Lords, but it would pass in exactly the form it left the Commons, with no added amendments. And what a precedent to set before a possible Nigel Farage succession. Or the government could put it into the king’s speech for the next session, making it a government bill. There is no sign yet of either happening. It’s said that Starmer worries about two religious figures in his cabinet who are outspoken opponents, but Wes Streeting and Shabana Mahmood have had their shout and would hardly resign over this.
Otherwise, any hope for this long-delayed reform relies on the luck of the next ballot for private members’ bills. Even if a supporter of assisted dying comes top, any MP may blanch at what this has done to Kim Leadbeater. For more than a year, her life has been consumed by the longest scrutiny committees, amid vitriolic hate from opponents, for authoring and promoting this most minimalist of bills.
Over many years I have written about the right to die when we choose. After the Commons vote, I said: “I hope I never need to again.” But if the government lacks the spine, there will be a lot more to say.
Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist
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