As politics has been dominated by Brexit over the last three years, many injustices have lingered. Under Cameron, the Conservative Party led the way for social liberalism through policies like legalising same-sex marriage, prioritising rehabilitation over punishment in prisons and introducing the real living wage. However, Cameron opposed one socially liberal policy that is, in Theresa May’s words, a burning injustice: the legalisation of assisted dying.
The new Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, is a political chameleon. This can be seen by the broad spectrum of MPs that supported him in his leadership campaign, from Matt Hancock to Jacob Rees-Mogg. Indeed, in two letters he wrote in the campaign to the Tory Reform Group and the One Nation Caucus of MPs, he called himself “liberal”, “progressive”, “compassionate” and “moderate”. If Johnson is to truly display his liberal, progressive, compassionate and modern conservative agenda, he should allow a debate for, and support the legalisation of, assisted dying.
In 2015, the House of Commons overwhelmingly voted against legalising assisted dying by 330 – 118 votes. Nevertheless, there is significant support in the Conservative Party for legalisation. Current members of the Government, such as Robert Jenrick MP, Jo Johnson MP and Kit Malthouse MP voted to legalise assisted dying. Furthermore, 84% of the public now support legalising assisted dying for terminally ill patients.
This debate comes down to the question; ‘Who controls an individual’s life? The individual or the state?’ It should be down to the individual, and not the state, to be able to make decisions determining life and death. In the same way that the state rightly allows the individual to choose whether to keep or abort their baby, with some limitations, the state should allow the individual to choose whether to end their own life.
It is wrong that people feel forced to travel abroad to pay thousands of pounds end their life. At the same time, those who cannot afford to do this have to suffer at the end of their lives. For those who don’t want to experience the last moments of their life in pain, but instead in their correct mental state and without pain, we should allow them to choose to die.
However, there are serious moral and legal considerations in this decision that must not be taken lightly. For the doctors who do not wish to assist those terminally ill patients who want to die, they should not be forced to do so.
The proposed law by The Campaign For Dignity In Dying, where assisted dying is limited to those who have a terminal illness and only have six months or less to live, is a sensible protection. In addition, there must be a waiting time for all parties to reflect before making their final decision and there must be a doctor and high-court judge that assesses the patient to ensure that he/she is in the correct mental state to be able to make a fully informed decision. Lastly, the dying person must end their life rather than any other individual to ensure that they are enacting the decision themselves. This law has worked in the US state of Oregon since 1997 and has now been copied in California, Washington, and other US states as a result.
This injustice has caused misery for many terminally ill people and their families for too long. Legalising assisted dying with appropriate and effective safeguards would allow people to have a peaceful, pain-free and dignified death.
Asher Glynn is the founder of The Liberal Conservatives (@Liberal_Tory). The views expressed in this article are those of the author, not necessarily those of Bright Blue.
