PARLIAMENT voted in favour of assisted suicide today despite warnings Britain’s “coercive society” will make the terminally ill and disabled feel a “duty to die.”
Disability activists expressed dismay as MPs voted 330-275 despite a debate that heard the most vulnerable are at risk from “malign intent” online and healthcare bias.
Labour MP Rachael Maskell said the legislation to allow terminally ill adults with a life expectancy of less than six months to end their lives by suicide in England and Wales is the “wrong and rushed answer to a complex problem” and “falls woefully short on safeguarding patients.”
Disabled people and ethnic minorities will face “very significant coercion” under proposals for sign-offs by two doctors, she warned.
“My biggest concern: coercion. We live in a coercive society,” she said.
“The UK spends £40 billion on advertising; ever more powerful algorithms drive us to content online.
“While we recognise coercion in relationships or elder abuse, in dying where there’s malign intent this Bill fails to safeguard — often only years after coercion do people recognise it yet within a month you could be dead.”
The York Central MP, who has worked as a NHS physiotherapist for 20 years, added: “Intrinsic coercion is very real — not least where the law has changed — repeatedly becoming an expectation verbalised as a duty to die.
“It’s why disabled people fear this Bill, it devalues them in a society where they fight to live.”
Labour MP Florence Eshalomi became emotional as she told the Commons she opposed the proposals as they stood.
The Vauxhall and Camberwell Green MP warned: “We must recognise the hard truth that health inequalities are wide and persistent.
“We know that black and minority ethnic disabled people have far worse health outcomes than the national average.
“I’ve seen this first-hand, caring for my mother who suffered with sickle cell anaemia.”
Labour MP for Mid Derbyshire Jonathan Davies added that terminally ill people stuck in hospital might consider it their “patriotic duty” to take advantage of assisted dying to free up beds in the event of another pandemic.
Diane Abbott, Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, opposed the Bill as its safeguards are not “sufficient.”
“They are supposed to be the strongest in the world because of the involvement of a High Court judge, but the divisional court have said the intervention of a court would simply interpose an expensive and time consuming forensic procedure,” she said.
“Is a judge supposed to second-guess doctors?
“So far from being a genuine safeguard, the involvement of a judge could just be a rubber stamp.”
Encouraging or assisting suicide is currently against the law in England and Wales, with a maximum jail sentence of 14 years.
Opposition and pro-change campaigners had gathered outside Parliament from early today.
Actress and disability rights campaigner Liz Carr said there is a “fine line between terminal illness and disability.”
Ms Carr, 52, who has starred in TV shows Loki and Silent Witness said: “As disabled people, there’s a really fine line between terminal illness and disability.
“Our lives go in and out of the NHS and the medical system, and I think we are probably slightly less trusting than your average person.
“We know doctors are fallible, we know mistakes are made about prognosis, and we are concerned that the power that the medical profession wields in our lives will become more uncontrolled if this Bill goes through.”
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, Chancellor Rachel Reeves and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper were among 15 members of the Cabinet who voted for the Bill.
Eight others, including Health Secretary Wes Streeting, Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, Foreign Secretary David Lammy, Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood and Women and Equalities minister Anneliese Dodds voted against.
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn also voted against.
Disability Rights UK said it is “deeply dismayed” by the Bill passing its second reading by MPs, adding: “This decision comes as a profound betrayal to disabled people across the UK, who continue to struggle to live with dignity in a society that fails to meet even our most basic needs.
“At a time when social care is chronically underfunded, accessible housing is scarce, and many disabled people are unable to afford food, energy, or other essentials, this legislation sends a chilling message: the government prioritises the right to die over the right to live.”
Backbencher MP Kim Leadbeater’s Private Members’ Bill will next go to committee stage where MPs can table amendments.
She said a new law would give society “a much better approach towards end of life” and said there is “plenty of time to get this right” in the face of concerns the Bill is being rushed through.
