Assisted suicide bid ‘irresponsible’

Attempts to revive the assisted dying bill are “dismal”, “irresponsible” and “beggar belief”, leading evangelical figures say.

The draft legislation is returning to the House of Commons because an MP, Lauren Edwards, who came second in the ballot for Private Members’ Motions, wants to bring it back. She blames a minority in the House of Lords for talking the Bill out and preventing it from coming to a vote in the last parliamentary session.

While there was around 75% public support for the Bill at first, there was a decline in support by the time the Bill failed in the Spring. Recent polling (from Whitestone Insight) has revealed a very low appetite for bringing the Bill back.

‘Beggars belief’

Liberal Democrat MP Tim Farron, a Christian, responded on X: “It beggars belief that we’re back here again despite all the evidence. If we care about vulnerable people and if we care about being evidence led, we will reject this outright at second reading, put an end to this nonsense and fix palliative care instead.”

Reform MP Danny Kruger said the news was “dismal” and added: “We’re going to be offered the same Bill that left the Commons with lots of ‘Oh, the Lords will clean up that glaring problem, don’t worry, just pass it’, on a take-it-or-leave-it, unamendable basis … So they’re trying to push through a dangerous Bill that they admitted needed significant improvement, because it’s their last chance. They must be stopped.”

Edwards said she did not intend to use the Parliament Acts to force the Bill through, but suggested it could be necessary if peers do not vote it through. Under the Parliament Acts, if an identical Bill is passed by MPs in two consecutive parliamentary sessions, it cannot be blocked again by the Lords.

Angus Saul, head of communications at the Christian Institute, called the move “irresponsible”. He said: “Despite activists’ claims, the House of Lords did not table countless amendments to Leadbeater’s Bill out of mere ‘delay tactics’. Peers emphasised over and again that the Bill was ‘full of holes’ and had not received ‘due diligence and proper pre-legislative scrutiny’, while professional bodies recognised that it was unsafe.

“The truth is, the more people understand the true nature of assisted suicide, the less they like it.”