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Assisted Dying

I am finishing, Mr. Martlew. My key point is that whatever their condition, some people will choose to react in one way and some in another. That applies right down to motor neurone disease. Last year, I had an intern whose father had motor neurone disease and appeared before Lord Joffe’s committee. The father died during the time that the intern was with me. In deciding to authorise assisted dying, the state must take a view on the reasonableness of one action or another, and take the consequences. We can get out of that conclusion only if the state can unequivocally identify those conditions that individuals ought not willingly to have to bear. That cannot be done satisfactorily and with clarity without having a secular state with clear, immutable values. There is no evidence that the state has those values nor expectation that it will have or that other states will be able to do so. Over time and between countries, there will be marked differences on this matter. My conclusion—this is my personal analysis—is that any argument presented must confront the accusation that we will be replacing the clear, albeit discretionary, law that we have now with a discretionary but fundamentally unclear law. We must answer that point.