Assisted Dying Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Campbell-Savours and Lord Howard of Lympne

Friday 7th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

My Lords, this issue is for me very personal. I have deep sympathy with those who are standing outside Parliament today, demonstrating on this issue, and with the millions of people who also feel strongly about it, many thousands of whom have written to Members of this House over recent weeks. I want to explain why this issue is very personal. I have now been ill for 31 years, and I have struggled on many occasions to survive different operations. Only last week I spent another week in hospital. Whereas five or 10 years ago I was opposed to assisted dying, I now realise that some people desperately want out. They want to leave the world. That has never crossed my mind but one day it might, and I want that right. To be frank, I do not want the courts to interfere in it. The courts will create congestion in the system which people want to avoid.

I also recognise that something is missing in the Bill to cover the issue of duress and coercion, which have been referred to by a number of noble Lords. We have to add something to the Bill to reassure people that that matter can be dealt with. I would go down the route referred to by the noble Lord on the Liberal Democrat Benches—forgive me, my memory is not too good at the moment—who referred to an alternative to court proceedings. We need a panel, perhaps comprising community-based guardians. I do not know whether they should be elected or appointed, or how they should be appointed if they are to be appointed, but they should be people who are capable of handling these sensitive situations. They need not necessarily receive a professional remuneration but they should be able to talk to people who have taken this decision. If, having talked to those involved, these people are uneasy, they should be able to instigate a further hearing of the issues, not necessarily in a court of law but in some forum. I say that because I am concerned that medical practitioners, whether the attending medical practitioner or the independent medical practitioner, may simply not have the time to sit down and ask the detailed questions that are necessary to secure the information to meet the criterion set out in the Bill.

When you are lying in a hospital bed—I have done it dozens of times over many years—you hear the conversations with doctors. They are going on around you all the time when they do their rounds in the morning or when they come back if there is a problem on the ward. I simply cannot imagine the circumstances in which doctors would be able to sit down and have that very meaningful, subtle conversation that can dig out the truth behind a particular application or declaration made by the person involved.

I therefore say to the House: please do not go down this judicial route; find another way of sensitively seeking to establish where the truth lies. If we do that, we will meet the objectives and concerns of all those outside who are basically worried that the Bill is going to be killed by the House of Lords because people have put up so many obstacles and amendments to wreck it. It would be a tragic day if that were to happen.

[Lord Howard of Lympne (Con)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as the chairman of Hospice UK, formerly Help the Hospices, which is the umbrella organisation for hospices in the United Kingdom. Hospice UK does not have a collective view on the principle behind the Bill, so everything that I might say in this debate is the view that I express personally, not the view of the organisation—although I hope that it is a view informed by the knowledge that I have acquired of the remarkable extent to which palliative care, an area in which we in this country lead the world, can alleviate the suffering, which is the backdrop to all the issues that we are discussing during the course of this debate.

I want to limit my brief remarks to the issues that arise in the context of the amendment. Palliative care is increasingly—not yet, alas, universally—available, but we are making good progress towards that objective. However, one of the problems that arise is that not everyone who could benefit from palliative care is aware that it is available. That has a direct bearing on the issues we are discussing and on these amendments. One of the things that it is vital to bring to the attention of someone who is contemplating the awful decision that the Bill makes possible is that they should be fully aware of the extent to which they could take advantage of palliative care to relieve their suffering.

In the context of these amendments, one of the factors that I would expect a court to take into account is the availability of palliative care for the person making the application, the extent to which that person knows about the availability of palliative care, and the extent to which that has been made available to the person concerned. I give way to the noble Lord.