RIGHT TO DIE. How Is That Going?

In 2015 I wrote a Blog Click Here about the case of a man with a degenerative disease who killed himself before he really wanted to, so as to avoid living to become incapable of doing so later when perhaps in much greater pain. As he said in an interview recorded before his suicide, if there were a law in England which would allow his friends to “assist” him in dying when life became unbearable, then he would have postponed matters.

His earlier death was the result of his knowledge that “assisting suicide” is a crime, so that if his friends acted to help him to die later then they might have to go to jail. Therefore, he killed himself whilst he could still move and do so alone.

This caused plenty of comment, with the usual heated certainty from both sides of the argument.

On one side, a feeling that this case highlighted the urgency of a legal framework for euthanasia.

On the other, that this case was terribly sad but changed nothing. In my earlier blog I mentioned the “thin end of the wedge” concern. That if euthanasia were to be legalised then first, it would be applied with the strictest of safeguards, to only the “hardest” cases. But that later, society would get more used to the general idea, and assist people to die when perhaps with better help and therapy those people might want to live instead.

And that later still, euthanasia might well be applied to people who did not want to die at all.

I quoted the arguments of two Parliamentary debaters at the time:-

Lord Falconer said from the heart – ?“Some say that the current law should just be allowed to continue. They are wrong. Without intending to be, and despite the very best efforts of those who seek to enforce it, the current law provides the option of an assisted death to those rich enough to go abroad; for the rest, it provides despair and often a lonely, cruel death — and no adequate safeguards”.

Just as emotively, Baroness Campbell of Surbiton said: “First, I must declare a very important interest. THIS BILL IS ABOUT ME. I did not ask for it and I do not want it but it is about me nevertheless. Before anyone disputes this, imagine that it is already Law and that I ask for assistance to die. Do your Lordships think that I would be refused? No; you can be sure that there would be doctors and lawyers willing to support my right to die. Sadly, many would put their energies into that rather than improving my situation or helping me to change my mind. The Bill offers no comfort to me. It frightens me because, in periods of greatest difficulty, I know that I might be tempted to use it. It only adds to the burdens and challenges which life holds for me.”

Now we are eight years on and in fact in Canada, euthanasia was legalised seven years ago. For those with “terminal illnesses” only.

But what’s this, from the Canada government website today:- click here

A specific statement – your condition need not be terminal. We are happy to kill you anyway. (I paraphrase)

And hang on, what about this paraplegic lady who is seeking a stairlift from the Canadian Army Veterans, an arm of the Canadian state, because she is entitled to it and because paraplegic ladies can’t run up and down stairs. A reasonable request. The stairlift was promised and four years after the promise it had still not been installed. What would you do? Surely, like she did, you would try to explain the extent of your suffering, of the hardship day by day which a stairlift would resolve.

You might perhaps say “ I just can’t keep going like this. I can’t keep living like this”.

Dangerous phrases to use in Canada these days. Because the response was not “We are so very sorry and your stairlift will be installed tomorrow.” No. It was “You know, if you really feel you can’t go on like this and feel you can’t do it anymore, you know, you have the right to die.”

Links to her case and others click here, Here and Here.

In my opinion the current score is Baroness Campbell of Surbiton ONE – Lord Falconer NIL.

On which note here is a jolly song Click Here

Here I am in Leeds, for all your Notary needs. Do get in touch whenever I can assist??and??whenever you have a legal issue which has any foreign element [email protected] or phone me or Louise +44 (0) 1138160116

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