Contributions
1,183 recent contributions in Hansard
HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)Yes; it would be inappropriate to ask a panel to operate in an adversarial system. It would be inappropriate to ask a psychiatrist and a social worker to act as a judge. We need a…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I regret that my right hon. Friend is making that argument. The fact is that the panel is already going to consider whether it is appropriate. There might not be some professional…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I apologise; the hon. Lady is absolutely right. No doubt there are representative bodies, whether it is patients’ groups or bodies representing professionals, that are satisfied…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)Yes, a number are neutral. I will be grateful if the hon. Lady can tell the Committee if there are any representative bodies working with the professionals who administer…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)The hon. Lady is going to check. My understanding is that all the bodies that represent palliative care professionals and end-of-life specialists are opposed to the Bill as it was…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I will in a moment. I was going to finish by saying that it is not correct or accurate to give the impression that Dr Cox or the Association for Palliative Medicine supports the…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)Thank you, Ms McVey. I do not want to be facetious because it is a serious point, but lots of new points were made in evidence to the Committee, including some in favour of the…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I am grateful to the hon. Lady for making that absolutely central point. This is a judicial process, and a decision is being made. I recognise that the hon. Member for Spen Valley…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)The hon. Lady does always come back to that point, and I respect it. She imagines that the good practice that is prevalent in the system will obtain automatically, in all cases,…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I certainly do. That is exactly the scenario that I fear, and I fear it within the NHS too. Let us not imagine that every NHS doctor has all the time and the access to the wider…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)If needed, there is the opportunity to refer to one. It is perfectly possible that the whole process of an assisted death could be done very well under the Bill—that is good…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I think the hon. Member for Spen Valley said yesterday that we had to grapple with this confusion, which is that there is a judge not sitting as a judge. It is slightly like a…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)Yes, but he or she will consider a reconsideration only on the basis of an application to reconsider made by the applicant. There is only one opportunity for an appeal and it can…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)The hon. Lady is absolutely right. Having said that the panel is not a proper multidisciplinary team, I agree that it is not a proper judicial entity either. It is a panel with…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)Throughout this debate, the hon. Lady and others have frequently made the case that we should stick with the existing systems, such as the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and the use of…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)It would be very helpful if the hon. Lady could—not now; it need not be in the course of these deliberations—publish the evidence of that assertion. Which senior judicial figures…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)It will be interesting to hear from the Minister, who is more equipped than the rest of us to opine on this. My understanding is that a judge sitting as chair of a judicial…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I am afraid that that is absolutely right. There is an essential problem with the role of the commissioner as the backstop—the Court of Appeal, as it were—for what are effectively…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)I think this is important. Those roles are what those judges do in their spare time—they could also chair a football club or something as well. The point is that they are being…12 Mar 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Twenty-third sitting)My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. If Parliament decides that we should proceed, then we should, and the public sector will be obliged to make accommodation and provide the…12 Mar 2025