Assisted Dying Bill [HL]

Baroness Harris of Richmond Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 22nd October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Harris of Richmond (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I apologise for repeating much of what your Lordships have already heard. Most, if not all, of your Lordships have received an enormous amount of mail, both written and by email, and I have been moved by many of the stories told. The vast majority of people have appealed to me to support this Bill, and I will indeed do so.

All we want for our loved ones is a peaceful death. One letter I received catalogued the appalling death of the writer’s mother. She was in a wonderful hospice, but her end was shocking, as the drugs she was given to help her deal with her pain did not work. I have heard from specialist palliative care doctors, who say that they know of many people dying every day in extremis, because the drugs that should have given them that gentle death simply did not work. We have heard much of this during the debate today. The drugs did not give them that gentle death, not because they were not cared for or loved, but because not all pain-easing drugs work on people in the same way. A GP, one of many who wrote to me, said that the choice is not between living and dying; it is between dying on one’s own terms or the possibility of dying in a way they do not want.

Lack of dignity, which almost invariably accompanies protracted end-of-life care, has a profound impact not only on the dying patient but on their families. One lady told me that her children still have nightmares having watched the desperate deterioration of their father before he died. Another letter from a gentleman in his 90s begged me to support the Bill, saying that he was becoming increasingly frail, and that added urgency to our deliberations. He wanted the choice about how to manage his death. Many other letters talked about having to sit beside a dying loved one, who only wanted their suffering to end. I believe it is our duty to address these heartfelt and heartbreaking stories.

A peaceful death, which by definition is pain free, should not be a fluke of individual medical circumstances. Too many die in horrific pain, and this should not be the case in the 21st century. Palliative care is still simply not good enough, and I have not heard any practical suggestions on how this might be improved to such a level. Assisted dying laws have proven track records overseas, and the high standards and safeguards put into laws there should be available to our citizens too, as the Bill proposes.

The Bill offers stringent safeguards so that no one should be concerned that, because of disability, mental health or other debilitating illnesses, anyone would be forced into requesting assisted dying—quite the contrary. It will allow terminally ill and mentally competent adults to request life-ending medication that they can choose to self-administer. That is the word: choice. I hope that your Lordships will allow the Bill to go through its legislative stages and that finally it will pass into law.