Dear Member of Parliament,
I realise that you simply are probably being bombarded with letters, whether pro forma or individual, as regards to euthanasia. It is a fancy issue, and it is sweet to see that many MPs appear to be taking it seriously – although I actually have to say that it’s disappointing that the federal government has limited the time for this bill to be scrutinised. Why the push? The bill is 38 pages long and MPs will only have 5 hours to scrutinise it!
I find it fascinating to see such diversity within the individuals who support this laws, with politicians akin to Keir Starmer, Ed Miliband, Lisa Nandy and Liz Kendall all in favour, and likewise in those that are opposed: Sadiq Khan, Gordon Brown, Ed Davey, Health Secretary Wes Streeting, Justice Secretary Shabana Mahood, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner, Bridget Phillipson, Dianne Abbott are against.
How will you as an MP make up your mind? Perhaps you’ll justify supporting the bill because opinion polls tell us that that is what your constituents want? But surely by now you should recognise the frailty of opinion polls – especially those paid for by those with a robust agenda – just like the wealthy campaign group Dignity in Dying. It’s amazing how pollsters find what their sponsors want them to search out. I suggest you read this text by Kevin Yuill in Spiked declaring the issues within the polls. Besides which, as an MP, would you vote for Capital Punishment if nearly all of people in opinion polls said they were for it?
I once participated in a debate on this subject in a Scottish university where a vote was taken before and after the talk. It was one among the few debates I actually have taken part in where there was a major change of view. The overwhelming majority before the talk were in favour of being “allowed to die in dignity at a spot and time of your individual selecting” (see how the motion, just like the polls, was skewed). Afterwards the pro-euthanasia position was still the most well-liked but by a really narrow majority. One of the lecturers complained to me afterwards that the scholars modified their mind because they’d never heard the other case be put to them!
Of course, when that is discussed on the BBC and in other media, it is generally focused around a selected individual or story – often very emotional. Who could argue against that?
But there are personal stories on each side. I actually have direct experience of many – especially as a pastor. I personally was seriously unwell in hospital, with an important deal of pain, and with a limited likelihood of living. To be honest if I had been offered euthanasia at that time I might need taken it – especially if I used to be told that I could be relieving my family. My faith in God would have prevented it, but I could understand the temptation.
Another friend who faced the identical situation said that it was precisely because he could understand the pressures and the temptations that it shouldn’t be left to the person to come to a decision. It shouldn’t be an option.
So, what are my essential reasons against? I realise your time is useful so I’ll just mention three:
Coercion
When Victoria Derbyshire asked Lib Dem MP Christine Jardine on BBC Newsnight how anyone would know if someone was being coerced, the MP was unable to reply. That is because there is no such thing as a answer. There isn’t any legitimate safeguard. There are many alternative ways to coerce people.
For example, elderly people often feel that they’re a burden. The Labour sponsor of the bill, Kim Leadbeater, even argued that feeling a burden was a legitimate reason to hunt assisted suicide. But we’re all burdens. I’m a burden (in addition to a blessing) to my family. We bear each other’s burdens gladly. My elderly mother, now in her 80s, shouldn’t feel under any pressure in any respect to be euthanised with a view to protect the inheritance of her children. When euthanasia isn’t an option, there is no such thing as a pressure.
An extraordinary glimpse into the long run, if this bill is passed, was seen this week on the London Tube. An advert, created by Let Us Choose, shows a girl wearing her pyjamas, dancing in a kitchen with the slogan “My dying wish is my family won’t see me suffer. And I won’t must.” How strange that the Tube may soon not be allowed to display adverts for junk food, yet can advertise suicide when a whole bunch of individuals attempt suicide on the Tube every 12 months!
When The Economist called assisted suicide a ‘fundamental liberty’, Andy Crouch answered succinctly, “You may have ‘the correct to die’ for about quarter-hour before you begin to feel ‘the duty to die’,” which shall be roughly quarter-hour before you might be informed that (for the greater good, to ensure) you might be “required to die”.
The journalist Kevin McKenna in The Herald takes this one step further by declaring that euthanasia can easily turn out to be a tool to do away with the weak, the disabled, the poor and other ‘economically unproductive’ members of society. He cites the case of a physician who’d been the essential organiser of euthanasia provision at a hospital in Calgary but was now a passionate opponent of euthanasia because he’d been appalled at the way it was getting used to focus on the weak and the vulnerable – including children and people who had made “advanced requests”.
And lest you think that that is an exaggeration, why not have a look at Matthew Parris’s column in The Times a number of months ago – where he said the unthinkable out loud: “Social and cultural pressure will grow on the terminally unwell to hasten their very own deaths in order ‘to not be a burden’ on others or themselves. I think this can indeed come to pass. And I might welcome it.”
Mission creep, or the slippery slope
AC Grayling, a patron of Dignity in Dying, in a podcast for the National Secular Society said that those that are confined to wheelchairs or the clinically depressed must also have the power of assisted suicide. But he went further: why not have assisted suicide for any reason? It is, in spite of everything, the last word in human autonomy.
The author Rupert Shortt, in The Eclipse of Christianity and Why it Matters, points out that, “In countries that allow either PAS [physician-assisted suicide] or voluntary euthanasia (lethal injections on the patient’s request), it’s striking how often patients access them for reasons apart from pain and suffering. The most typical reasons within the US state of Oregon are ‘lack of autonomy’ and ‘a decreasing ability to interact in activities that make life enjoyable’. In 2016, the Dutch government, which legalised euthanasia in 1984, proposed extending its law to elderly individuals who have a ‘accomplished life’. This naturally led pro-life campaigners to ask in regards to the form of signal such a change would send to the elderly. By legalising euthanasia and PAS in 2016, Canada moved even faster than the Netherlands.”
What guarantee are you able to give that despite Leadbeater’s promise of “the strongest safeguards on the planet”, the UK is not going to find yourself going the Dutch route, where last 12 months 138 Dutch residents with psychological conditions were allowed to kill themselves?
Which brings me on to my last point.
The Death Culture
This latest law wouldn’t be a light change to the law, enabling a compassionate approach to a number of suffering individuals who need it. This could be a fundamental change in society, written into law. It would change, perhaps perpetually, the fundamental principle of the sanctity of life – which is the muse of each law and medicine within the UK. It could be an extra step within the advance to what I call ‘the death culture’ of the progressives.
Speaking of which, safeguarding minister Jess Phillips says that that is ‘progress’. It isn’t. It is regress – a regression to the pre-Christian Greco/Roman/Pagan view of the world. A world wherein the weak, vulnerable ‘burdens’ to society are only removed. You can call it compassion for those who wish, but such Orwellian use of language doesn’t take away from the incontrovertible fact that it is a regressive step back right into a darkness where compassion was considered to be the last word weakness. Why would you vote for such a hellish society?
I, and plenty of of your constituents, who’ve thought of this deeply, would echo the plea of the previous Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, who urged that resources, time and energy be put into palliative care – not killing people. Care not killing. Doesn’t that sound like something price voting for?
Yours etc
David A Robertson
