Assisted Dying

Lord Joffe Excerpts

Monday 13th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Joffe]

My Lords, because the Director of Public Prosecutions can only interpret but not change the law, the policy puts members of society at risk for two reasons. First, patients have to rely not on doctors but on individuals who have no experience to assist them to die, which will result in botched suicides. Secondly, safeguards are needed before the patient ends his or her life and not after it is ended, as required by the policy. The solution is to change the law to allow assisted dying with rigorous safeguards which would protect vulnerable members of society and allow terminally ill patients to end their suffering by ending their lives, if that is what they want.