Sharp criticism has been levelled against plans to legalise assisted suicide in Scotland.
In their formal response to Liam McArthur’s Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill, the Care Not Killing (CNK) alliance called the proposals “uncontrollable, unethical, and unnecessary”.
The Bill would allow terminally ailing people aged 16 and over, who’ve been living in Scotland for at the least 12 months and are registered with a GP, to hunt assisted suicide.
CNK CEO Dr Gordon Macdonald hit out on the proposed eligibility criteria, saying, “No-one ought to be eligible for assisted dying.”
He pointed to places like Oregon, Canada, the Netherlands and Belgium where the standards for assisted suicide has widened considerably since first being introduced.
He expressed scepticism about proposed safeguards and argued that they could lead on to abuses, noting that in Oregon some individuals who died by assisted suicide admitted to feeling like a burden on their family members.
“It should remain illegal to provide individuals with a substance for the aim of ending their very own life,” he said.
In his submission, Dr Macdonald also questioned proposals to record the terminal illness because the reason behind death, relatively than the assisted suicide, saying this amounted to “mandatory false reporting”.
“What consideration has been given to the conscience rights of doctors and registrars who don’t want to falsify records?” he said.
“This provision could possibly be vulnerable to a challenge under Article Nine of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) – freedom of thought, conscience and religion.”
