Contributions
956 recent contributions in Hansard
HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I look forward to it.11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I am grateful to the hon. Member for his intervention, but I am not proposing to change any legislation other than the Bill before us. All the other legislation to which he refers…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)Will the hon. Lady give way?11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)The hon. Lady has moved on considerably from the point that I was going to make, so I took it that she was not going to take interventions. Although I would have liked the…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I beg to move amendment 34, in clause 1, page 1, line 4, leave out “capacity” and insert “ability”. This replaces the concept of capacity based on the Mental Capacity Act and…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I have a suspicion that the hon. Gentleman may have made that point already in one of his many interventions. Withdrawing treatment is not the same as someone making an informed…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I have no intention of rewriting the Mental Capacity Act. It should stand exactly as it is and be used for the purpose for which it is intended. That is not the intention behind…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I look forward to the hon. Lady’s further comments, but as I said, the psychiatrists were very clear that they did not believe that this was a sufficient safeguard, and we should…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)Yes, that is exactly what I am aiming to do. The hon. Member makes an excellent point. There is a wide variety of views on this, but in actual fact, much as I do not wish to…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)The hon. Gentleman puts his finger on the exact point: it allows people to make a decision about whether or not they want to continue treatment; it has not been used in this way…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I say to that what I have been saying throughout: a test of mental capacity is not sufficient for this Bill. For example, the Royal College of Psychiatrists states that the Mental…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)That is a very interesting intervention. I cannot comment on that because I have no knowledge of how the Mental Capacity Act was drafted or the evidence that was taken.11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I heard Sir Chris Whitty in particular say that it would be preferable to have a more straightforward Bill that did not have too many bureaucratic hurdles for people to overcome.…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Ninth sitting)It is really important that we establish whether this will be defined as a treatment or indeed as something quite distinct in law. My understanding is that the word “treatment”…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I am conscious that the hon. Member for Ipswich sought to intervene before me, but may I press the hon. Member for Solihull West and Shirley slightly on his point? When I asked…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)That is an extremely wise observation. I regret enormously that there was not more opportunity, before the legislation was drafted, to have those discussions between experts,…11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)I agree exactly with the hon. Lady’s point. The Act was not designed for this purpose, and it is essential that we carefully scrutinise whether it should be used in this way.11 Feb 2025HANSARDTerminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eighth sitting)That is an absolutely relevant point. The Mental Capacity Act was not drafted in anticipation of it ever being used for this kind of scenario. Therefore, it is really incumbent…11 Feb 2025HANSARD UK-EU RelationsI thank the Minister for advance sight of his statement. I welcome much of the statement’s content—that the Government are serious in their commitment to resetting our broken…06 Feb 2025HANSARD Police Grant ReportThe hon. Gentleman is precisely right. Having had conversations with local police teams, what I find frequently is that there is a large turnover of police officers in…05 Feb 2025