We’re all going to die. And we all hope it will be quick and painless. But what if it isn’t? What if the last months of your life become an endurance test of agonizing pain without respite? Wouldn’t you want the right to end it? I know I would. And I’d want public health professionals to help me. Which is why I welcome the first steps towards reform of assisted dying law taken by the Scottish Parliament last week.
There is a long road ahead. Those opposed to change have signaled clearly they will not accept Parliament’s decision. They will do everything they can to prevent it progressing. So those who want choice at the end of life will need to work harder than ever to get it.
Perhaps the most pernicious aspect of the campaign against reform has been the suggestion that offering the right to die is an attack on the rights of disabled people. Labour MSP Pam Duncan-Glancy has led this attack. She says the MacArthur bill devalues disabled people, making it easier to get support to die than to live.
This is wrong. I’m sure there are still plenty of people who harbour negative, maybe even hateful, attitudes towards people with disabilities. But you will not find them amongst the ranks of those seeking the right to die. Indeed, campaigners for assisted dying are amongst the loudest voices calling for increased palliative care. The objective is to widen options and choice, not narrow them.
Disabled people support reform every bit as much as the population as a whole, four out of five wanting change. Indeed, it is because of the passionate struggle by a number of high-profile disabled campaigners that this debate has moved up the public agenda.
Nonetheless, the manner in which some of the opposition to this bill is conducted will cause anxiety amongst many disabled people. So we should be crystal clear that the proposed changes are not about giving anyone the right to do things to you but giving you the right to make choices for yourself. Clear too that this is not about capacity, but suffering.
Opponents of this bill talk about a slippery slope. The intention is to make people think that if they allow the principle of a restricted right to die to be established, soon those restrictions will be loosened and removed. They point to other countries where this is exactly what has happened.
They omit to say that the evolution of policy in other countries has only happened each time after public debate and democratic votes. And it happened because many of the fears about potential abuse of the legislation did not materialise. No-one is being hoodwinked. This is not a slippery slope but rational civic engagement.
Much has been said about the role of doctors and other health workers in this debate. I get that some will feel very strongly that they cannot provide assistance to someone to die. So I am relaxed about providing an opt-out so professionals are not obliged to act against their own beliefs.
But I am extremely unimpressed by references to the Hippocratic Oath and the notion that helping someone end their life runs counter to the mandate to “first do no harm”. This bill deals with people who are in the final stages of their life, suffering from an incurable illness which is causing chronic and extreme pain. They are already experiencing a great deal of harm, visited upon their body by the disease which has consumed it. Denying someone in this situation the choice of ending their pain is not doing no harm, it is allowing that harm to continue.
There will always be some who are opposed to giving human beings autonomy over their own bodies for religious reasons. They believe that our existence and purpose comes from a supernatural deity. That life is God given, and only He can end it. This is not a rational position so it is not really something you can argue with.
It is also somewhat paradoxical. Most religions say that material life on earth is but one phase of existence; death is not the end. So it is unclear why anyone holding this view would want to eke out the last embers of life on earth no matter how much agony it requires. Why not accept the body is done and allow the spirit to move on to a different plane? Why see death as the denial of life rather than its completion?
Whatever. Theology isn’t really my bag. The point is some people hold strong religious beliefs which compel them to take a different view on this than I do. And I respect their right to do so. Indeed, I will continue to fight for the freedom of everyone to have whatever faith or belief which gets them through this life.
No-one will force them to choose to end their life if their beliefs prevent them. In return, I ask that they do not deny me the right to control how I depart this earth.