Naz Shah MP: speeches

Speeches

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Seventeenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The Minister referred to a patient not wanting to keep a written record. How does that fare if there is a potential issue of negligence later on? Is that not a requirement of every NHS service that we provide? For example, in the case of a kidney donation where an independent assessor was needed, the details would have to be kept. I am just a bit confused. I wonder if the Minister might comment on that.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member makes a valid point. That brings us to a very important question: do we wait for something to have happened? In this instance, people will have died. If we were considering kidneys, for example, and the issue of consent, it would require somebody independent. It needs a specialist. We come back to the point about specialisms: whether they relate to diagnosis, coercion, the care pathway, palliative care or the drugs that bring a person’s life to an end, which we will discuss later, these are specialisms. I know that later my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley will speak to her amendment about the panel, which is intended to require expertise. That is what amendment 285 speaks to, and I hope hon. Members will support it. Amendment 286 would set out the requirements for the co-ordinating doctor and ensure that the standards are upheld throughout the process of assessment, so that the patient and clinician have the highest levels of advice available. Even though the co-ordinating doctor might already have sought the advice of specialists as part of their assessment, the purpose of having an independent doctor is to assess the patient without preconceptions influenced by the co-ordinating doctor’s decision-making process. It is therefore important for the clinician to have access to the same level of advice to inform their clinical decision making. In medical practice, should a second opinion be sought, the person providing that second opinion might consult a range of sources to establish an opinion. This measure would therefore be in line with normal medical practice. I hope that hon. Members will support the amendments.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  From what I hear, my hon. Friend is supportive of the amendment. Does he agree that it just sets out what he says is best practice? I am trying to understand the objection to setting out good practice on the face of the Bill.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Will my hon. Friend give way?

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The Minister’s point speaks to what my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud and I have spoken about in relation to the amendment, so I wonder which bit he supports. The Minister says that there will be extra time, but my hon. Friend pointed out that doctors do this routinely, so the objection is only that it will be on the face of the Bill. I just want to understand the Minister’s position on that.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Will my hon. Friend give way?

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I rise to speak to amendments 285 and 286, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for York Central. On amendment 285, we have to understand that, in medicine, clinicians only retain the areas of expertise in which they have clear confidence. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud, who made very powerful points that, if anything, actually support this amendment. This is why we have developed a health system with so many specialities. Although generalists have incredible knowledge, they cannot confess to the depth of understanding that someone who dedicates their career to a speciality has. Therefore, the amendment seeks to draw on such knowledge rather than assume that a GP, for example, specialises in all fields of medicine. Clause 4(4) would require a generalist to work alongside a specialist to secure the understanding of a patient’s diagnosis and prognosis. Once again, I recognise that my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud suggested that that already happens and does not need to be tied up in law. However, I feel the amendment gives us more protections if we are to make the Bill safe. It would then enable specialist clinical advice to be provided in the conversation about treatment options.

• 4 Mar 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am trying to understand. My hon. Friend is saying that the oncologist is a specialist, but that they might not be the first doctor to have the first discussion; he said that they might not want to be a part of this process. I would like to understand that a bit more.

• 27 Feb 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  My question is slightly different from that of my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell), but it speaks to the NHS. The Financial Times reported that there has been a 92% increase in whistleblowing cases between 2015 and 2023, including in the NHS. My constituency has in it the headquarters of the Bradford teaching hospitals NHS foundation trust, whose former chair Dr Max Mclean, a decorated police officer, maintains that he has been forced to take legal action after being removed from his position following a decision to raise concerns about governance and patient safety. The trust argues that chairs, non-executive directors and governors are not workers under whistleblowing legislation, potentially leaving them without the same protection as other NHS staff when reporting patient safety and governance concerns. Given the serious implications for NHS transparency and accountability, will the Government commit to reviewing the issue and provide clarity to the court, as well as allocating time for Parliament to debate better protections for whistleblowers?

• 27 Feb 2025 · Gaza: BBC Coverage · Hansard source

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  I thank the Secretary of State for getting to grips with this issue so quickly and acknowledging that what happened on 7 October and what happened subsequently in Gaza is of huge significance; her understanding gives me hope. Will she commit to coming back to this Chamber and updating us on the outcome of whatever happens with the BBC investigation?

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Unfortunately, I do not agree. I do not even agree with the term “gag clause”, which has been used a few times now. From where I stand, this is not a gag clause; it is an amendment that protects those who are most vulnerable. In Committee I have referred continuously to the most vulnerable, as have other hon. Members, and I will return to the evidence from Dr Jamilla Hussain. I do not agree with my hon. Friend’s position. We need to listen to what doctors who are treating vulnerable patients say about the risks to those people, and then we need to amend the Bill to reduce those risks. Bluntly, there is a choice here. The British Medical Association says that if the Bill becomes law, doctors should be able to raise the subject of assisted dying with patients. Palliative medicine doctors such as Rachel Clarke and Jamilla Hussain, who deal with this every day, are deeply concerned by that prospect, and they want us to avoid it. There is no papering over this: the doctors disagree and it is up to us—the Committee— as lawmakers, and this House, to decide which of them makes the stronger case. I genuinely think that the BMA makes a strong case. There is no doubt in my mind that it is motivated by empowering doctors to give the best possible care to their patients. It is natural that the BMA looks at existing practice among doctors. Currently, doctors can discuss all possible treatments and pathways with patients—the key words being “possible treatments and pathways”—so the BMA makes the case that that should also be true for assisted death. In the end, however, I cannot agree with the BMA for one reason: assisted dying will be qualitatively different from every previous kind of medical intervention that has been legally permitted in this country. We have never permitted doctors to legally assist patients to take lethal drug combinations with the sole purpose of ending their lives. Some things really are different from what has come before; if the Bill becomes law, assisted dying will be one of those things.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I do acknowledge that, but ultimately I am a Member of Parliament for my constituency of Bradford West, and we have a doctor who has been doing research with its communities. I come from a community where there is huge deprivation: Bradford West has two of the most deprived wards, and one of the youngest populations. During covid, people there were DNR-ed—so they do not have that confidence. I accept that others may have different opinions, but I come back to the point that I made earlier: which case is more convincing? Do we raise the safeguards? Dr Jamilla supports assisted dying but she made it clear that, although she supports it for some people, who may well benefit from assisted death, the truth is that there are people who the Bill fails to protect. That is what I am speaking to, and that is what amendment 8, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South, speaks to. The Committee is talking about people who are facing the ends of their lives. On every day of their working lives, doctors who have spoken to this Committee talk to those people. They are treating exactly the kind of patients who may seek assisted dying if the Bill becomes law. They are deeply concerned that if doctors raise the subject of assisted dying with their patients it will, in too many cases, seem like a suggestion. I appreciate that this is a private Member’s Bill and not a Government Bill, but that places an even heavier burden on us to get things right. We cannot ignore the testimony of those who have the most relevant experience. Too many Government Ministers, MPs and local councils from all parties, including mine, have done that in recent decades. For example, the sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses said for years that the Horizon system was not working, but Ministers from my party, and from the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, said that they were wrong. Time and again, they were dismissed. Ministers thought that they knew more than the people who were using Horizon on a daily basis. Now we know exactly who was right. Similarly, for three decades, several thousand NHS patients, mainly haemophiliacs, claimed that they had been negligently given transfusions of blood infected with hepatitis and HIV. Minister after Minister, first from the Labour Government of the ’70s, then from the Conservatives, then Labour and then the Conservatives again, insisted that no such thing had happened. Some conceded that perhaps it had happened—but on a small scale. In 2017, to her credit, the then Prime Minister Theresa May announced a public inquiry into those claims. It turned out that the patients were right and the Ministers had been wrong. That is what I am talking about. Several highly experienced palliative medicine doctors warned us—

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Surely all medical codes of practice explicitly or implicitly bar doctors from raising courses of action that they believe could unquestionably harm a patient. Does it therefore not follow that doctors only raise courses of action for patients that they believe will not unquestionably harm them, even if they believe some courses of action are more likely to be in the patient’s best interests?

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am not sure that the amendment would be that kind of gag clause, so I disagree. If a patient says, “Give me all the options to bring an end to this,” the judgment of the doctor could be that assisted dying is an option. If that is the case, perhaps we need to look to the Government’s and Ministers’ wash-up process. When we are tidying up this Bill, I am sure that there will be plenty of opportunities for the Government to put in the significant words that safeguard patients. That is my feeling, but I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend no doubt speaks from his experience of being a mental health nurse. I think there is space for that, and there are amendments that we will come on to when we talk about later parts of the Bill that deal with those initial conversations. I will be happy to address that issue then. I also welcome any more support that he can offer on those conversations based on his expertise. As I was saying, in practical terms, we have evidence that in many cases, although not all, that desire will fall once a patient has had time to think through their diagnosis and once they have had good medical care for their illness or condition, and, in some cases, psychiatric support—a holistic package, perhaps even with social work intervention. Surely all Members would agree that we should give seriously ill people, who have just had such a shocking diagnosis and prognosis, time to think and to receive good medical care before they start the process of applying for assisted death. That surely applies to those of us who voted for the Bill on Second Reading every bit as much as those of us who voted against. I will put it as plainly as I can: there is a significant risk from the Bill that people will be shocked by their initial diagnosis and prognosis, and, in that shocked state, will be more likely to apply for assisted dying. There is also evidence, however, that if they were to pause between the diagnosis and applying for assisted dying, they would be much less likely to have an increased desire to hasten death. This amendment would not be a perfect protection for people suffering from the shock of their initial diagnosis and prognosis, but it would be a clear safeguard that would protect many of them. I want to make it clear that I was probably 60% against and 40% in favour of the Bill on Second Reading; I want to see a stronger Bill, with protections for the vulnerable. There is a significant group of vulnerable people who this Bill would put at increased risk—those who might take a decision to apply for assisted dying that, if they had had time to consider it and to receive medical and social care, many would not have taken. I ask hon. Members to support my amendment.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  That is not what I am trying to get to here. Maybe there is some confusion on my part; I will make it clear as I carry on. The issue is that people already know that assisted death is an option in the wider context, just like when we talk about abortion, as my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe pointed out earlier. I am supporting amendment 8 because it further safeguards people, as the practitioner cannot be the one to raise it. Perhaps if I continue with my speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich may find his answer. We can come back to it if necessary. As I was saying, many people will be poorly informed on medical matters and reluctant to ask questions of doctors. Many will have capacity under the Mental Capacity Act but, as we have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford, they will have greater capacity to take some decisions than others. For all those people, there is a danger that if a doctor raises this subject first, they will hear it not as a neutral comment, but as a suggestion. Not all of them will hear it as such, but some will. Although not all expert witnesses who appeared before us endorsed that view, it is a concern that some raised. Others took a different view, such as the British Medical Association, which wants doctors to be able to raise assisted dying. It gave several reasons in its written evidence: “Doctors should be able to talk to patients about all reasonable and legally available options…Doctors should be trusted to use their professional judgement to decide when and if a discussion about assisted dying would be appropriate, taking their cue from the patient as they do on all other issues…A prohibition would also create uncertainty and legal risks for doctors, which may inhibit effective doctor/patient communication and understanding.” We cannot simply adopt or reject the amendment because of what the experts say. Instead, we must go through the arguments that the different experts made and consider which we find most convincing. It is our responsibility as legislators to make this decision. Personally, I found the voices raising concerns to be deeply convincing. As with all this Committee’s inquiries, we must look at everything from the angle of safeguarding those who are vulnerable across society. For example, if someone is isolated, with very few close relatives or friends, and if they feel that they cannot challenge what the doctors say to them, they will be deeply trusting of or even dependent on their own doctor. That is not to say that we should be cynical about doctors, who are giving vital support to our most vulnerable citizens; it is to say that we have to look at the reality. There is one kind of relationship between a confident and socially well-supported person and their doctor. For some who may lack confidence and have little or no social support, that relationship may well be very different. That point was repeatedly stressed by senior doctors who gave evidence to the Committee. We heard from witnesses that they do not think that this is a hypothetical danger. Let me remind hon. Members of some of the expert witnesses who told us about the real risks posed. Dr Rachel Clarke, a palliative medicine doctor at Oxford, said: “If, for instance, you say to a vulnerable patient who has just been told they have a diagnosis of terminal cancer, ‘Have you thought about assisted dying?’, I would suggest that stating it broadly like that is a form of pressure and that you are potentially unintentionally coercing that patient. The very act of raising assisted dying in that way will make that vulnerable patient think, ‘God, is this doctor telling me that my life is not worth living any more?’ Autonomy is much more subtle and complicated than we assume from outside.” –– [ Official Report, Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Public Bill Committee, 28 January 2025; c. 75, Q93.]

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is the right and proper thing to do to give options, but we are talking about vulnerability. We have had the debate a few times now about people with vulnerability, and we heard during evidence sessions about coercion, capacity and all the issues relating to amendment 8 in respect of those with vulnerabilities being presented the option of assisted death. When I speak to my next amendment, I will cover some of this, because the Bill does not necessarily leave us with confidence that vulnerable people will be safeguarded. That is what amendment 8 also seeks to address. Dr Rachel Clarke is a doctor who spends every working day with people who need palliative care. Her evidence cannot be laid aside. Dr Jamilla Hussain, who also gave evidence, is in favour of assisted dying in principle, but she raised significant concerns about the Bill as drafted, including on this issue. Dr Hussain said that her patients in Bradford have reduced access to palliative care, partly because they fear that doctors might try to end their life. She talked about how she worked with “not only ethnically diverse communities, but those who are socially disadvantaged…I have taken this Bill to them and they have made it really clear—this is not just one community, but several, and I am not speaking on my behalf, but on theirs—that they are really fearful because this is what happened to them in covid. It affected everyone, but it affected some communities disproportionately because our services are not equitable. That could profoundly affect their healthcare, and not only in terms of end-of-life care. They are saying, ‘We will not even come to hospital ourselves, because we are worried that this would happen.’ This is not an academic or theoretical risk. We saw it happen in covid in Bradford. There were communities so worried that their loved ones were dying in hospital that they stayed at home and died earlier.” –– [ Official Report, Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Public Bill Committee, 29 January 2025; c. 190, Q247.] Perhaps in some cases they died a death that could have been preventable. Dr Hussain said that it is “not a theoretical risk.” Dr Hussain also said: “The risk for somewhere like Bradford, where we are doing okay—we have a long way to go—is that the Bill creates a fear in those communities. I have been going out and trying to build trust—being trustworthy—and they made it really clear to me by saying, ‘We trust you; we don’t trust the system. So if I came into hospital, even if your team was there, I would be really scared to access palliative care.’ In a system that is doing okay, we are now adding this new risk. We need to mitigate against that.” –– [ Official Report, Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Public Bill Committee, 29 January 2025; c. 199, Q259.] That is what we need to do. We need to listen to what the doctors who are treating vulnerable patients say about the risks to those people.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Building on the intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Ashford, in most cases where life-support machines are switched off, by definition people are being supported to stay alive. In most cases, I would argue, they do not have the capacity—their capacity is not tested. The Minister appears very certain that the amendment would not be workable, but how can the Government be so certain of that, in the absence of any impact assessments on the workability of the Bill in the first instance?

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford. I rise to speak to amendment 8, which stands in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Chris Webb), and amendment 276, in my own name. I note that the hon. Member for Solihull West and Shirley spoke to amendments 8 and 124, which overlap and complement each other, although they are slightly different. Before I get to the crux of why the Committee should support amendment 8, it may be helpful to spell out what it would do. Currently, clause 4(1) reads: “No registered medical practitioner is under any duty to raise the subject of the provision of assistance in accordance with this Act with a person.” The amendment would change that to: “No registered medical practitioner shall raise the subject of the provision of assistance in accordance with this Act with a person who has not indicated to that or another registered medical practitioner that they wish to seek assistance to end their own life.” In a nutshell, that would mean that a doctor could not be the first person to raise assisted dying with a patient. The patient would have to raise it first, either with the doctor who had the initial discussion or with another doctor who referred the patient onward. I urge Members to support the amendment, because it would provide another safeguard for vulnerable people. Many people affected by the Bill will be isolated; many will be poorly informed on medical matters and reluctant to ask questions of doctors.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Does my hon. Friend agree that the GMC writes this in detail for the purposes of treatment? The Bill is not about treatment, so therefore there is a difference in its very nature.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I thank the Minister for giving way for what might not be my last intervention. Everybody agrees that the legislation is new—it is not something that we have done before—so have the Government made any assessment of the training that would be required for people who deliver assisted dying? Who would set that training?

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I agree that that is what the evidence shows us, and there are many concerns in other jurisdictions as well. I will come back to that distinction.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I have just finished that example, Mrs Harris. Several highly experienced palliative medicine doctors have warned us that doctors raising assisted dying with patients would have two very harmful effects. The doctors said that it would scare patients away from palliative care, especially those from minority communities or disadvantaged backgrounds. They also warned that in some cases, if a doctor raised the subject of assisted dying with a vulnerable patient, that person would not hear it as a possibility being discussed; instead, they would hear it as a suggestion from a powerful person who, in some instances, they might be scared to challenge. The question we have to ask ourselves is: are we going to be that Committee that ignored the evidence of the experts who deal with this issue on a daily basis on the frontline with those very people at the end of life who the Bill is actually aimed at? Or are we going to risk being part of a future assisted dying Bill scandal because we placed ourselves above those experts by supporting a view of a wider body? That body has very valid reasons—no doubt—from its own position but is not, in its entirety, a frontline delivery expert, as palliative care doctors are. Those warnings are too stark for me—for any of us, I submit—to ignore. We cannot ignore the concerns that those doctors have raised. If any Committee member accepts the concerns of the experts, that a vulnerable person would not hear assisted dying as a possibility being discussed but instead as a suggestion from a powerful person, I sincerely hope that they will vote in favour of this amendment. I turn to amendment 276, which I tabled. It would add a subsection to clause 4, which concerns the initial discussion between a person with a severe illness and a medical practitioner. This new subsection would impose a pause or an interval of 28 days between a person receiving a diagnosis and prognosis of the illness that might end their life within six months, and when they could speak to a doctor about assisted death. Currently, there is no such interval. I tabled this amendment in response to the concerns raised by several senior and experienced doctors in evidence to this Committee. Several doctors who gave evidence—especially the psychiatrists—noted that a diagnosis of serious illness often leads to a major increase in depression and a desire to hasten death. However, on depression and the desire for death, the psychiatrists also said that when a patient gets treatment for their physical symptoms alongside social care and sometimes psychological treatment, that person may well change their mind. This amendment aims to prevent people from opting for assisted dying while they are suffering from the initial shock of having a serious illness diagnosed. Let me talk in more detail about some of that evidence. In particular, I will bring the Committee’s attention back to Dr Annabel Price, vice chair of the liaison faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, who has great expertise in this field. I will quote from her evidence at some length, because she talks very clearly about the evidence that we have about the effect of a diagnosis of serious illness on somebody’s mental health. Her evidence raises very important concerns about how the Bill, as it is written, would affect patients who have just received a diagnosis of serious illness. She said that “if we think about people with palliative care needs towards the end of life—so the people who would qualify under this Bill—around 20% will have diagnosable depression, around 10% will have a wish to hasten death, and around 4% will have a more persistent wish to hasten death. Those wishes may not be expressed unless they are assessed for. One of the things that I would do in my clinical practice would be to look for treatable mental disorder in people who express a wish to hasten death.” –– [ Official Report, Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Public Bill Committee, 30 January 2025; c. 270, Q351.] Dr Price went on to say: “There is a lot of research evidence around depression in people with palliative care needs and people nearing the end of life. We know that depression is common, and across a number of studies it is at around 20%—much more common than in the general population. We know that depression is strongly associated with a wish to hasten death, and that if depression is found and treated in that group of patients, there will be significant change in the wish to hasten death.” –– [ Official Report, Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Public Bill Committee, 30 January 2025; c. 275, Q359.] Dr Price also went further and said: “There are a number of associations other than depression with a wish to hasten death, and they include difficult symptom experience, poor functional status—needing a lot of help with things—and being socially isolated. Those are really key ones. They also include a sense of loss of dignity and feeling like a burden on others. These things can all come together to make life feel very unbearable. We know that there is also an overlap between a wish to hasten death, which is a response to suffering, and feeling that one is better off dead, ending one’s own life or harming oneself. I was involved in a study where we asked people both the wording of “a wish to hasten death” and the suicide question from the PHQ9, which is a depression screening tool. Those who had a wish to hasten death were 18 times more likely to also feel suicidal, according to the psychiatric definition, than people who did not have a wish to hasten death. There is a strong association.” –– [ Official Report, Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Public Bill Committee, 30 January 2025; c. 275-276, Q359.] I have quoted Dr Price at length because she sets out clearly some of the problems we need to address before the Bill will be fit for purpose. From her evidence, we know that when people receive a diagnosis of a serious illness with a prognosis that they may have around six months to live, that has serious psychological effects. We also know from her evidence that one of those psychological effects is what she called an increased desire to “hasten death”. She said that, in some cases, this means that the patient becomes “suicidal”, while in others it may not mean that the patient is suicidal, because they do not want to positively do something such as killing themselves, but they do wish that death would come to them sooner. It should be clear to us that a desire to hasten death will certainly be relevant to the decisions of any patient who wants a discussion on assisted dying. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Dr Price provided evidence that if a patient’s desire to hasten death increases immediately after the diagnosis of a serious illness, it is likely to decrease once several things have happened. In a psychiatrists’ survey of patients, they found that the desire to hasten death often decreased once the patient had time to reflect on their diagnosis and prognosis; once they had received adequate medical care; once they had social care to allow them to live their day-to-day lives and, in some cases, to relieve their isolation; or in some cases, once they had psychiatric support and adequate pain relief or intervention to relieve them of their pain. In practical terms, we have evidence that a patient who has just had a diagnosis of serious illness with a prognosis of possible or likely death within six months would be more likely to want to die.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. I will be speaking to that in the next group of amendments, so I do not want to go through it in detail now, but I absolutely accept that that was a disgraceful situation—

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fourteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Given what my hon. Friend has just said—that he accepts the premise of my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford that the doctor would have to assist—can he help me to understand where that leaves the issue of autonomy if a doctor is, as he has agreed, allowed to assist in the decision?