Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Committee (14th Day)

Motion

That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.

Amendment to the Motion

At end insert “and takes note of the progress of its scrutiny of the Bill during the current session”.

My Lords, today is our final day scheduled for the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. I am despondent that this Bill, so important to so many, has failed not on its merits but as a result of procedural wrangling. There is no prospect that the Bill can get through this House today or before Prorogation ahead of the King’s Speech on 13 May. Consequently, we cannot complete the Committee stage, let alone have a Report stage, when we could have tested the House’s views on the amendments proposed and then had a Third Reading debate.

If the elected Chamber decides to return this Bill to us in the next Session, as I very much hope it will, there will be ample time for us to pick up where we left off and complete the proper task assigned to us as a revising Chamber. We are not a democratically elected House, but we are rightly held to account for what we do here, or, in this case, what we have not done. Members of the public, who support assisted dying by a very large margin, will be asking themselves why Parliament has failed to enact a measure that they believed would and should become law after Members of Parliament voted in favour of it in the other place. That is why I believe it is not only right but imperative that we take some time today to consider why we find ourselves in this position.

I remain as committed to this Bill as I have been throughout the whole process, and so, I believe, do a majority in this House. We know that a majority of the Commons do, as do a majority of the public, as demonstrated in survey after survey by reputable polling organisations over a long period of time. The assisted dying Bill commands strong views. In those circumstances, it is for us in your Lordships’ House to debate with civility and patience. We need to set an example, in the way we conduct this debate, to everybody else engaged in the debate. I have kept that important point in my mind at all times in the course of this debate.

As a result, we were sent a robust, safe Bill that is at least as good, if not better, than most of that wide range of Bills I have been associated with over the last 30 years. There have of course been important issues for this House to consider, but we have also to consider how to ensure that the assisted dying process, if there is to be one, is focused on the patient and can operate in a way that is safe but not so burdensome that it becomes unworkable.

We have debated all these issues and very many others. We have had time to debate at appropriate length all the issues that needed to be debated. Yet at the end of this Session, having completed only seven out of 59 clauses after 13 days of Committee, we have reached no conclusion on any part of the Bill or on the question of whether we should we return the Bill to the Commons. The only Committee debates of equivalent length in the last 20 years in your Lordships’ House have been for massively larger Bills. The 176 pages of the Welfare Reform Bill took 17 sittings. The Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill was 392 pages and required 15 sessions. The Crime and Policing Bill is 429 pages and has needed 15 sittings. For a Bill of this size— 51 pages—following such intense scrutiny in the Commons and drawing upon the vast experience of other jurisdictions around the world that have introduced assisted dying, we have made lamentably slow progress in our considerations. We could unquestionably have got through all the stages of our consideration of this Bill if we had conducted ourselves as we normally do.

A letter was sent to all Members of the House on 7 September last year, signed by the noble Lord, Lord Harper, and my noble friend Lady Berger. That letter sought to persuade the House—and I agreed—to introduce a Select Committee. It said, rightly, that at that point, in September, we had several months in which it was entirely possible to complete all stages of the Bill—and yet we have not. Why has this happened? It has happened because the Order Paper has been flooded with amendments, because the speed with which we have got through our work has been unnecessarily slow, and because some opponents— not all—resisted all attempts, including by some noble friends who are no friends of the Bill, to agree a path by which we could reach a conclusion. With over 1,200 amendments across 80 groups, no more than four groups were dealt with in a day in Committee, and on most Committee days it was fewer.

The debate in Committee has found some areas where improvements can be made, and I have accepted that, as would be normal for any Bill of this significance—for example, the eating disorders clause, the express reference to multidisciplinary teams, and extra protections for those between 18 and 25. In 12 of the 14 cases, I put down proposed amendments to deal with the Delegated Powers Committee’s recommendations.

Overall, the debates have revealed the strength of the Bill and the considerable thought that has gone into these issues before the Bill reached this place and as it went through the other place. By way of example, and it is a key example, the key protections of five stages of safeguard that have to be gone through, including the two-doctor structure and the panel, is a structure that works and is well thought-out. It is perfectly legitimate to consider, as the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, suggested we do, whether the High Court is better than a panel. I do not think that it is, but this issue was fully debated in the Commons, and it is a point of principle that, if we had acted as we normally do, we would have resolved on Report by agreement or by a vote—but we never got there.

I tried on a number of occasions to agree an informal timetable where the key issues might be debated on the Floor of the House in Committee, but in a proportionate way so as to ensure both scrutiny and that we completed our work in a reasonable way. I am very grateful to those Peers who have attended countless open meetings I have had, particularly those who made it clear that they would vote against the Bill at Third Reading, but who also believe that it is necessary for this House to finish its scrutiny in its entirety so that it can pass a final judgment.

The noble Lord, Lord Carlile, was hugely helpful in discussions last December about what the most important issues for this House to consider were. On Wednesday 3 December last year, we circulated a revised grouping after a meeting with other interested Peers. After that meeting, we wrote:

“We believe that the more that colleagues are prepared to engage in these discussions in good faith, the better it will be for the orderly and timely conduct of the extremely important debates we are having on the issue. We would welcome the co-operation of as many Peers as may wish to contribute”.

The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss—who I am happy to see in her place today—spoke powerfully on my Motion on 8 January about the danger to the reputation of this House and helped to agree a set of 13 themes which might provide the basis for a sensible timetable for Committee. Each of those attempts has been unsuccessful. It was impossible to get enough of those who tabled amendments to agree.

I express my gratitude to the Government Chief Whip, who, without ever breaching the neutrality that the Government adopted, was helpful and co-operative at all stages of this Bill going through the House. I am also grateful to all in his office, in particular, as he said, Michael Bleakley, who has dealt so patiently with the groupings each week. The Chief Whip made available 16 days for consideration, which was unprecedented for a Private Member’s Bill. The Bill did need more time than a normal Private Member’s Bill—and it got it. The reason that the Bill has failed to complete its processes in this House is not because of a lack of time; it is because a small minority were not willing to co-operate, as we normally do, to ensure that there can be proportionate debate.

Over and over, opponents said that it was inappropriate that this was being dealt with by a Private Member’s Bill. I disagree with that. Assisted dying is not a Bill which could ever have been in a manifesto because it is a matter of conscience. A Private Member’s Bill is the normal way that most issues of conscience are dealt with. There are other legislative vehicles, but this was the most appropriate. Throughout the process, the sponsor in the other place and I have had the fullest official support, which has never breached in any way the neutrality of the Government. We have had access to parliamentary counsel for drafting and officials to help us with the development of policy options—although the policy choices have remained, rightly, for the sponsors. These officials have been absolutely first class. I have had considerable experience of doing Bills as a Minister. This team has been complete and second to none.