Assisted Dying Bill [HL]

Lord Jopling Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 22nd October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jopling (Con)]

My Lords, because of my respect for life, I have always been opposed to euthanasia, as well as so-called assisted dying. I should make it clear at the beginning that my views are in no way influenced by religious teaching.

My opposition to the Bill is also based on my anxieties at its consequences if it were to become law. First, there are the temptations which would arise for greedy families, who might wrongly encourage the premature demise of a distressed relative for reasons of convenience or money. I give the example of my own mother, who was widowed at 58 and went through a number of periods when ill health and temporary depression caused her to wish life could come to an end. Of course, we always jollied her out of that attitude, but I know that if we had encouraged her to end it and it had been available, she would have done so—not least because her doctor wrongly told her several times during her widowhood that she did not have long to live. In the event, she lived a fruitful widowhood and died at 96.

Finally, I am concerned that the likely consequences of what I would describe as doctors sympathetic to euthanasia and what were called in a previous debate in 2014 doctors for hire, doctors who are philosophically strongly supportive of euthanasia. When we last had these debates on the Bill of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, to try to deal with the problem of doctors for hire, I tabled an amendment whereby no doctor could sign the certificate more often than once in four years. In fact, we did not get to debate it in Committee, but it is on the record that the noble and learned Lord recognised the problem of doctors for hire and agreed that we should discuss ways to deal with it. If this Bill should go to a Second Reading, I give notice that I shall again table an amendment seeking to restrict doctors to sign these certificates at reasonably infrequent times.

European Union Referendum (Date of Referendum etc.) Regulations 2016

Lord Jopling Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jopling (Con)]

My Lords, while I am fully aware of the shortcomings and the nonsenses of the European Union, I speak tonight in favour of our staying within that organisation. I must say that I sometimes feel that my patience is tried by the way in which those who oppose it seek to deride it. My experience goes back a long way on this. I feel that the anti-European approach has not changed very much at all over the years. We still have the same people, or their philosophic heirs, bridling at the very word “Europe”.

I remember almost 60 years ago, in 1957, moving what I think was the first motion of the Conservative Party conference about Europe. Then, all we were asking for was that we should seek with others to form an economic alliance with the original six members, which eventually turned into EFTA. It was overwhelmingly agreed by the party conference but there was a substantial number of Conservatives who voted to oppose it at that time. That was nothing to do with the six—it was to found an economic association that, as I say, turned into EFTA.

Over the years, we have still had what I sometimes regard as the same mindless approach to anything that has a Europe tag to it, relating to the colour of passports, women’s institutes’ cakes and straight carrots. I remember back in the 1960s, when I was a member of one of the first departmental Select Committees down the road, which Dick Crossman set up, we had the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Agriculture saying that we should not join the European Common Market because we would then have to put up with grey kippers. It all reminds me very much of giving a dog a bone.

Now, of course, the Eurosceptic element is having a field day belittling the Prime Minister’s agreement to reorganise our relationship with the European Union. Quite frankly, they cannot have it both ways. They wanted many more fundamental changes than they have got, nearly all of which could be achieved only through a treaty. But within the timescale that the Prime Minister had set out of having a referendum before the end of next year, it would clearly be impossible to get a treaty through the processes. It was just not within the timescale and therefore treaty changes were impossible, but that is for the future.

We now have our new relationship with the EU. We are out of the euro; our borders are protected under the Schengen agreement; we have barriers to benefits for immigrants seeking them; and we are excluded from ever-closer union. This puts us into a new position, which is a sort of halfway house between full membership and solely being members of the EFTA agreement. That is an admirable position to be in and far better than being outside with little influence over crucial EU decisions, which could be very damaging to us.

Of course, not all Eurosceptic arguments are trivial in the way that I have talked about. One argument is to refer to loss of sovereignty and the desire for our Parliament here to make our laws. I do not object to a certain loss of sovereignty in this modern, global world but I do not hear dissent from those Eurosceptics when we come to consider the massive loss of sovereignty which we have with regard to NATO. It is a far greater loss of sovereignty when we commit our armed services to the possibility of our servicemen dying under the command of foreign generals. I am not against NATO in any way; I am vice-president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and as far as I am concerned, long live NATO.

As a former member and president years ago of the Agriculture and Fisheries Council, I am convinced that the relationship between European Parliaments and Governments over these last 50 years or so means that, after 70 years without a great European war, much of that period of peace is due to the development of the European Community—not all of it, of course. I have two sons, and I regard the creation of the European Community as a principal reason for them not having been involved in such a great European conflict, unlike so many young people over the centuries who have died in a succession of European wars. I see this period of European peace as the greatest achievement of my political generation.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Jopling Excerpts

Monday 1st June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jopling (Con)]

My Lords, the gracious Speech and so many of the speeches we have heard today referred to the one-nation approach to politics. I therefore suppose I ought to declare an interest as a former member of the one-nation group in another place. Sadly, when one leaves the other place or even comes here, one is excommunicated from that admirable dining group, but there we are.

I shall say a few words about the constitutional position of your Lordships’ House. For many years now, I have said that, given a Conservative Government, the worst job in the world must be to be government Chief Whip in your Lordships’ House. I recognise the problems which confront my noble friend the Chief Whip with only 29% of the vote in this House. I certainly welcome the statements from opposition parties recognising that final decisions lie with the other place and that the Salisbury convention still has great relevance. I hope those statements are the truth and are not mere words. Of course, we accept the right of the Opposition to make mischief and a nuisance of themselves so far as the Government are concerned, but I hope that the traditions of both Houses will be acknowledged, given that the Government of the day have only 29% of the vote.

My principal concern is the composition of your Lordships’ House. For 10 years or so, I have made various suggestions, so let me comment on your Lordships’ House as I see it in the light of the general election. I do so in the light of two principles. First, I do not want to see an elected House, and secondly, I do not want us to move towards proportional representation. So far as proportional representation is concerned, the electorate do not want it. Although it was not on that exact issue, the referendum made public opinion clear. The fact of proportional representation to which I am so opposed is that it is a potential recipe for weak government through alliances.

Next, I come to the problem with regard to numbers. By common consent, your Lordships’ House is much too big with 788 members. I find it a joke when I talk to my American friends who say that their upper House manages very well with 100 members and ask what on earth we want 788, or around 800, members for. Therefore, I believe that the House should have its membership reduced by statute in tranches at successive general elections to a figure which we could discuss: let us say 500, or even 400. That is for discussion. The question is: how do you do it? The answer is, in exactly the same way as for the 92 hereditary Peers who were elected back in 1999. Each party caucus knows best who attends, who contributes, who should stay and who should go, and I would reduce the numbers in that way, with each party deciding at each general election. Total numbers must be reduced down to what would be a statutory figure of, as I say, 500, for example, and during a Parliament a statutory limit should be put on the number of new elevations, let us say of 5%.

I come to what should be the composition of Lords by party. It is vital that the House has some reflection of the current political environment. It should be broadly representative of current thought. Again, I think by common consent, there is a general view that the Cross-Benchers, who play such a valuable role, might have a statutory 20%, but I note in passing that they now have 178 Members, which is 23% of the whole vote. However, with regard to party representation very careful thought needs to be given. There must be a good deal more flexibility than we have now. The present balance does not reflect the current democratic atmosphere in this country, and the only way is to find a formula so that one can allocate numbers for each party which broadly reflect the current atmosphere.

I have often warned your Lordships’ House that if a leader were to come forward, as has happened in other countries, and bring a party from nowhere into forming a Government, the composition of your Lordships’ House would look particularly stupid if there was no representative here of that new governing party. In a minor way we have seen this happen in the course of the past month. We have seen the Scottish Nationalist Party gain 4.7% of the votes—8% of the seats in another place—while in your Lordships’ House they have no representation at all. UKIP, with 12% of the votes, has only one seat, and has only three Members of your Lordships’ House. I am sure that some of my friends will kill me for saying this, but in the next list some representative appointments ought to be made from both the Scottish Nationalist Party and UKIP.

Conversely, as I come to the end, with regard to the Liberal Democrat Party, which had 7% of the votes and only 1/10th of 1% of the seats, yet has 13% of the membership of your Lordships’ House, at this time it would be very hard to justify new Liberal Democrat appointments to this House, because that party is significantly overrepresented at this time. If the Liberal Democrat Party believes in PR, surely it would be a good moment for its Members to vote among themselves to find a substantial number to stand down under the new rules, to make way—this is important—for some of those highly qualified former Members of the other place to come here. I think particularly of Sir Menzies Campbell and Sir Alan Beith. It would be very hard to justify making new Liberal appointments at this time.

I am sorry—I have spoken longer than I should have done. I have previously drawn attention to the need for flexibility, and today that is even more important than in the past.

Assisted Dying Bill [HL]

Lord Jopling Excerpts

Friday 16th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

The first point about the two doctors is dealt with in Clause 3, because the second doctor has to certify that he is content. The noble Lord is getting frightfully agitated. If he looks at Clause 3, he will see that it requires certification by a second, independent doctor.

Secondly, the noble Lord asked whether I would enter into discussions in relation to putting in the Bill that one of the doctors has had to be involved in the care of the patient. No, I would not because I think it is satisfactorily dealt with in the Bill as it stands, for the reasons I have indicated. I will answer the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, first, and then go to the noble Lord, Lord Maginnis.

[Lord Jopling (Con)]

I am concerned very much about this problem of doctors for hire. Does the noble and learned Lord not agree that there is another way, on top of the ones he has described, of dealing with this problem? If he looks at my Amendment 36, he will see it suggests that no doctor should sign a declaration of this sort more than once every four years. I am intent on establishing the principle; whether it is four years or less, I am perfectly happy to have discussions and hear what other people say. But surely to deal with the problem of doctors for hire you could put a limit on the frequency with which a doctor could sign these declarations. The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, who I believe is not here today, has put down another amendment, Amendment 37, which proposes a timescale of very much less—I think that, for one of the doctors, it is once every two months, which I think is far too frequent. I would be perfectly happy on Report to put down another amendment, if the noble and learned Lord would give it a fair wind, which would put a limit—let us say two or three years—on how often a doctor could sign such declarations, which, after all, will be pretty rare events.