Christians urged to maintain praying after MPs vote to legalise assisted suicide

Christians are being urged to maintain on praying after MPs voted within the House of Commons to legalise assisted suicide in England and Wales.

MPs voted 330 in favour of Kim Leadbeater’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, to 275 against. Those voting in favour included Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer. The bill will now be scrutinised in the approaching months and subject to further votes before potentially becoming law. 

The Church of England’s lead bishop for healthcare, Dame Sarah Mullally, who had joined other faith leaders in warning against legalising assisted suicide, said that safeguarding the vulnerable “must now be our priority”.

“I actually have been deeply moved watching proceedings unfold within the House of Commons today. My prayers are with all those that have been affected, who’ve shared and heard their stories, and facilitated this debate,” she said. 

“The Church of England believes that the compassionate response at the tip of life lies in the availability of top quality palliative care services to all who need them.

“Today’s vote still leaves the query of how this may very well be implemented in an overstretched and under-funded NHS, social care and legal system.

“In the wake of the choice MPs have made, safeguarding essentially the most vulnerable must now be our priority within the Parliamentary process to return.”

The Christian Institute said it was “deeply dissatisfied” by the vote and called the bill “dangerous and divisive”. 

“We are grateful to the various MPs who spoke and voted against it, and the fight will not be over,” he said.

“We know that the more people learn about assisted suicide the less they prefer it. Those MPs who supported the principle of the bill but have concerns about its practical implications must now take the time to scrutinise it properly.

“They will find the promised safeguards are nothing greater than a mirage. They will then have an extra opportunity to vote against the bill before it clears the Commons. If it does go to the House of Lords, it’s in no way guaranteed to pass there.

“We urge Christians to maintain on praying and to be able to approach their MPs again over the approaching months. This is a life and death issue. Now will not be the time to present up.”

Christian MP Tim Farron was amongst those that spoke out against the bill during Friday’s five-hour debate within the Commons. 

He had urged MPs to vote against it to guard vulnerable people from coercion, and said that the priority should as an alternative be greater investment in quality palliative care. 

“I feel that freedom is crucial, that the fitting of the person underpin an honest society, but that my right should be held in check in the event that they nullify your rights,” he said. 

“Since we all know – and we actually do know – that to legalise assisted dying is to allow people to die who will self-coerce, to allow people to die as a consequence of manipulative coercive control, to allow people to die outrageously not due to an actual sovereign selection but due to a heartbreaking Hobson’s selection as a consequence of inadequate palliative care, then I don’t have any right to impose that ultimate and most appalling constraint on the liberty of essentially the most vulnerable people in our society.

“So I urge all of us to face in defence of those most vulnerable people, to defiantly defend their liberty, to make a renewed commitment to world-class palliative care and to human dignity, and to reject this bill.”

Dr Gordon Macdonald, chief executive of Care Not Killing, shared in the frustration over the final result. He said that legalising assisted suicide was a “dangerous and ideological” move “that can make many elderly, terminally unwell and disabled people feel like a burden and end their lives prematurely, exactly as we see within the US state of Oregon, the model for this draft bill”. 

Dr Macdonald concluded: “Our current laws protect vulnerable people and don’t need changing, as an alternative we’d like to focus our attention on how you can ensure we offer the highest palliative care to those that need it.”

Right to Life said it might be redoubling its efforts to stop the bill from becoming law. 

Spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said: “This is just the primary stage of an extended journey through the Commons after which the Lords for this dangerous assisted suicide Bill. We are actually going to redouble our efforts to make sure we fight this bill at every stage and make sure that it’s defeated to guard essentially the most vulnerable.

“A really large variety of MPs spoke out against this extreme proposal in Parliament today. They made it clear that this dangerous and extreme change to our laws would put the vulnerable in danger and see the ending of many lives through assisted suicide.

“Serious concerns remain about how this laws would operate in practice, and the strong response from MPs across all parties shows these issues won’t simply disappear.

“The Government must now provide an in depth impact assessment, outlining how this Bill would affect the NHS and our judicial system. MPs deserve full clarity on its real-world consequences before they’re asked to vote again.

“This Bill can and should be defeated in Parliament. It still has an extended option to go and presents an acute threat to vulnerable people, especially within the context of an overstretched healthcare system. Even members of the Prime Minister’s own cabinet recognise this problem and that, inside this environment, certain people will likely be particularly vulnerable to coercion.”