UKAnalysis

Vote on assisted dying Bill due to be a cliffhanger as Britain’s Labour opposition mounts

Wes Streeting, health secretary and potential future Labour leader, is against the plan

Campaign group Dignity in Dying tied notes representing the 'dying wishes' of terminally ill patients to trees in at Parliament Square, Westminster, this week. Photograph: Michael Leckie/PA
Campaign group Dignity in Dying tied notes representing the 'dying wishes' of terminally ill patients to trees in at Parliament Square, Westminster, this week. Photograph: Michael Leckie/PA
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Mark Paul London Correspondent
Fri Nov 15 2024 - 15:25

In Thursday’s crisp early winter sunshine, campaigners for assisted dying gathered at Parliament Square in Westminster. They tied hundreds of pieces of pink paper to the trees surrounding the square. Each handwritten note represented the “dying wish” of a terminally-ill patient.

“My dying wish is that my children would know how much I loved them, and I don’t want them to have the trauma of seeing me in pain or undignified,” said one note.

“My dying wish is to be pain free at home, looking at the garden,” said another.

The campaigners were from Dying With Dignity, a group that wants the law changed to give terminally ill people in Britain the right to an assisted death. Those gathered outside parliament tied to the trees 650 pink notes in all, one for each MP in the House of Commons who will have a free vote at the end of the month on a new Bill to legalise assisted dying in England and Wales.

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The free vote and the Bill, introduced by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, fulfils a campaign promise from prime minister Keir Starmer to former television celebrity and assisted-dying campaigner Esther Rantzen. She has terminal cancer and wants to die at home in her New Forest cottage. The House of Commons last voted on the issue in 2015, when a similar proposal was heavily defeated.

[ Assisted dying: ‘If I cannot consent to my own death, who owns my life?’ ]

Starmer was among the supporters of assisted dying when the last vote was held and campaigners had dared to hope that under his new Labour government, it might finally pass this time. Yet in recent weeks opponents to the proposals have started to push back and evidence has emerged of splits over it in Starmer’s cabinet.

UK health secretary Wes Streeting has ordered a review of the potential costs of upgrading palliative care services if the Bill passes. Photograph: Peter Byrne/PA Wire
UK health secretary Wes Streeting has ordered a review of the potential costs of upgrading palliative care services if the Bill passes. Photograph: Peter Byrne/PA Wire

Health secretary and future leadership contender Wes Streeting has said he will oppose the Bill. Last month Streeting, seen as an ambitious reformer in the Blairite mould, told a private meeting of Labour MPs that he was against it because he was worried that NHS palliative care services in England and Wales were not good enough to give terminally ill patients a “real choice”.

In subsequent media interviews he confirmed his opposition and this week he suggested there were “resource implications”.

“If parliament chooses to go ahead with assisted dying, it is making the choice that this is an area to prioritise for investment,” Streeting said. He ordered a review of the potential costs of upgrading palliative care services if the plan passes. Labour peer Margaret Hodge said resources fears were “daft”.

Under new details of Leadbeater’s plan published this week, it emerged that terminally ill patients who wanted an assisted death would need approval from two doctors and a judge. Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary who would also be responsible for implementing elements of the plan, also confirmed she was opposed to it.

[ Laws allowing assisted dying should be strongly opposed, says Catholic Primate ]

Meanwhile, other cabinet members, such as work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall, have come out in support of the proposed legal change.

The government is meant to remain neutral on the proposal, according to a note sent to ministers last month by Simon Case, the cabinet secretary.

Yet the clear opposition of Streeting, seen as a future leadership contender, presents a risk for Starmer, who has so far refused to say where he stands on the latest Bill. Streeting’s interventions are said to have swayed many new Labour MPs this week. If Starmer publicly backs the Bill and it falls, especially after a potential leadership rival has rejected it, it could weaken his position.

An initial vote is expected after a five-hour debate on November 29th. It may be a cliffhanger.