Dr Lucy Thomas and Penelope Jenkins support the House of Lords’ examination of the bill, but Margaret Pelling says they seem to be blocking the legislation, not scrutinising it
Simon Jenkins is right that the Lords should not kill legislation by procedural manoeuvre (Unelected Lords are blocking assisted dying: that’s a democratic outrage) . But peers are not playing games with the assisted dying bill; they are finally providing the independent scrutiny it has so far lacked. And the carefully crafted campaign slogans collapse under examination.
Rather than addressing suffering, the bill makes no mention of it – let alone requiring, as most assisted dying laws do, that a person be experiencing suffering that cannot otherwise be relieved. And, rather than respecting autonomy, as the Swiss do, under this bill the state – not the individual – decides the circumstances in which ending your life is acceptable, and makes doctors the agents of that judgment.
