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Assisted Dying

My Lords on every occasion that proposals to change the law have been put before your Lordships’ House they have been defeated by significant majorities. If there is to be further debate, it should be properly conducted in the House of Commons. Our votes have revealed that the majority here still agree with the view of the 1994 Select Committee of your Lordships’ House which insisted that, ""dying is not only a personal or individual affair. The death of a person affects the lives of others … the interest of the individual cannot be separated from the interest of society as a whole"." To disregard that belief would fundamentally alter the relationship of a doctor with their patient, which is the why the BMA and the royal colleges continue to oppose a change in the law. It would also endanger public safety and put disabled people at risk. The right to die would rapidly become the duty to die. Two weeks ago, in the Sunday Times, the writer Martin Amis compared Britain’s elderly people, in his words, to, ""an invasion of terrible immigrants"," and he called for "euthanasia booths" on street corners. Others have said that people with dementia represent a terrible economic burden to society. What a chilling and bleak future that is. Surely a civilised society can do better than that.