THE Communist Party called on MPs today to oppose the assisted suicide Bill currently before Parliament.

MPs are due to vote tomorrow on the second reading of the End of Life (Terminally Ill Adults) private member’s Bill submitted by Spen Valley MP Kim Leadbeater.

The Bill has split the government down the middle, with Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and Work & Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall among those in favour while Health Secretary Wes Streeting and Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmoud are opposed.

The Communist Party statement “notes profound concerns expressed by disability rights groups … about the potential of this legislation to place vulnerable adults at risk of being placed under pressure to end their lives.

“These pressures may be social, driven by the lower value assigned to disabled lives in a profit-driven capitalist society. 

“They may come from family or others who stand to gain from a person’s death… or lose from the cost of care for that person. They may arise from pressures on an underfunded health and social care system in Britain, which most on the left acknowledge to be in crisis.”

The party cited the example of Canada, where assisted suicide is legal, as a warning as to how poverty and a lack of access to proper medical care could become motivations for medically assisted death.

It also noted the relative lack of scrutiny given to private member’s Bills compared to government legislation, with no need for an equality impact assessment on its consequences, urging MPs to vote against passage of the Bill.