Assisted Dying Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hayman and Lord Bishop of Carlisle

Friday 16th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Carlisle]

My Lords, very briefly, I support Amendment 13, proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, and the other amendments in this group.

I note the detailed points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. Like the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, I am struggling a bit with them. However, it seems to me that these amendments are generally sensible and important. The arguments in favour have been very well and movingly advanced. They would make this proposed legislation safer, as the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, suggested.

I shall take this opportunity to point out that our support for these and other amendments does not in any sense signify the Church of England’s support for the overall intention of the Bill. I am sure this applies to other Members of your Lordships’ House. Some suggestion has been made, not least in the media, that our position lacks clarity. Nothing could be further from the truth. We have every sympathy with and respect for—I cannot emphasise this too much—the honourable and compassionate motives that inspire the Bill’s proponents, as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, indicated.

The church’s stance on assisted dying was made abundantly clear by the General Synod in 2012. When this subject was debated then, not a single member of it opposed a motion to keep the current law. Of course, some individual church members may and clearly do disagree but, to avoid any misunderstanding as we debate these amendments, that remains our corporate stance for reasons of principle and pragmatism that have already been very well rehearsed in this House.

[Baroness Hayman (CB)]

My Lords, reference has been made to the GMC, and therefore I should perhaps draw attention to my interest as a member of that body, although I, of course, speak today purely personally and not on behalf of the GMC.

I want to address two issues relating to doctors. First, I support Amendment 15 on changing from a registered to a licensed medical practitioner, which is an important safeguard and correction.

However, I have severe concerns about Amendment 13. The right reverend Prelate said that he thought it would make the Bill safer for patients. I have to disagree. I think it would make the Bill impractical and restrictive. The reasons for that are partly the reasons outlined by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. People who are desperately ill who receive a diagnosis one or two years before their death very often think about moving. They sometimes move to be near relatives or into a care home, but moves even half a mile up the hill, as I learnt recently, can mean the severing of a long-term relationship with a GP practice. It is impractical and unfair to ask people who have moved in these circumstances to rule themselves out of access to the provisions of this legislation.

It is also impractical in terms of doctors themselves. We were taken back to the days of Dr Finlay in many ways by the speeches of the noble Lords, Lord Carlile and Lord Cormack. Very few people these days have a decades-long relationship with a single general practitioner. I am very nervous, because my legal education ended in 1969, of taking on the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, but he spoke about the realities of multiple partners in general practices in the National Health Service today. Certainly, my experience in my new practice is that you will be seen by any one of a number of partners there. However, the amendment says very specifically that the person must have been registered with one of the two doctors,

“for medical care for at least six months immediately prior”,

not at the practice but with that specific doctor. That is very difficult for people to comply with.

Equally, like patients, doctors also move. They move to different parts of the country, and they retire. You can imagine many circumstances in which reading and applying those specific provisions would simply rule out for patients the ability to access this legislation. For that reason I oppose this amendment.