The landmark assisted dying bill could be in jeopardy after the Royal College of Psychiatrists withdrew its support.
The college, which represents psychiatrists across the UK, cited “serious concerns” about the already limited capacity of NHS mental health services, as well as the role psychiatrists would play in assisted dying decisions.
MPs voted in favour of legalising assisted dying last year, but the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill has generated “huge controversy” while progressing through Parliament, said Sky News. The bill will return to the House of Commons tomorrow, where MPs will vote once again, after first reviewing the 150 amendments that have been made to it.
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But at least 15 MPs “who either abstained or supported the bill previously are now considering voting against it”, said The Telegraph, leaving the bill’s fate in the balance. “Interventions from medical bodies” like the royal college “have prompted more MPs to come forward with concerns about the bill”.
The Royal College of Psychiatrists’ (RCPsych) move is a “major blow to the bill’s credibility”, said Dan Hitchens in The Spectator.
Originally, Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP sponsoring the private member’s bill, said a judge should approve each assisted dying case, but the Ministry of Justice dismissed the idea.
The “replacement” is a panel of experts made up of a lawyer, a psychiatrist and a social worker, but “remarkably, Leadbeater seems not to have consulted” RCPsych about the change, said Hitchens. “It seems she is dragging them into a process they regard as fundamentally flawed.”
The group is apprehensive about the bill’s “inadequate” conscientious objection clause – which gives professionals the option to opt out of participating in assisted dying procedures – as well as concerns regarding the duty of care psychiatrists have towards their patients.
The impact that assisted dying could have on the medical profession’s “do no harm” principle could be “seismic”, said Nadia Khan, a palliative medicine consultant and spokesperson for the British Islamic Medical Association, in The Yorkshire Post. Legislation that “compromises this moral safeguard” risks “disrupting the very nature of healthcare”.
The British Medical Association, the union representing doctors in the UK, maintains a neutral stance on whether laws around assisted dying should change, but the bill still has a wide base of support among the medical profession.
One supportive GP, Susi Caesar, told the BBC she “will be at the front of the queue” to help terminally ill patients have the death they choose. “I think that’s the core joy of my job – being with people to the very end of their health journey.”
What next?
A final vote is “possible” when the bill returns to the House of Commons, but “MPs have put forward so many amendments to discuss that they are unlikely to get through them and progress to the next stage”, said The Telegraph.
The “flurry of amendments” has brought more criticism from opponents of the bill, who worry lawmakers will not have enough time to review the proposals before Friday’s debate. The next stage, a third reading, “is now expected next month” on either 13 June or 20 June.
Even if the bill does pass, it won’t take effect until 2029. Initially, there was a “two-year ‘backstop’ between the legislation being passed and put into practice”, but Leadbeater recently extended the period to four years, said Sky News.
