A leading Labour Committee member has criticised the sponsor of the assisted suicide Bill, Kim Leadbeater, for weakening the Bill, and shared her belief that the legislation, amended after Committee Stage, is not fit for purpose.
Naz Shah, Labour MP for Bradford West, completely disagrees with Kim Leadbeater’s claims that she has “listened” to evidence to provide effective safeguards to her Bill. Shah commented “when there’s this narrative of ‘we have listened,’ no: that’s not true. The evidence is there in black and white. The biggest changes to the bill… all of these big-ticket items – the ones that have weakened it, in my opinion – have come from the bill sponsor”.
Shah added “[I]t’s just not fit for purpose”.
High Court removal by sponsor has “weakened the bill”
One of the high-profile “big-ticket items” referred to by Shah was the removal of the Bill’s flagship safeguard, High Court oversight. After earlier definitively telling The Times that she would not scrap the centrepiece High Court judge safeguard in her Bill, at 10pm the night before the first day of line-by-line scrutiny, after MPs had returned to their constituencies for the February recess, Kim Leadbeater announced that she would be tabling an amendment to scrap the “safeguard” in the Bill that required a High Court judge to approve assisted suicide applications.
Leadbeater attempted to position the replacement as “Judge Plus” and was resoundingly criticised for using what many saw as a deeply misleading term.
Leadbeater has proposed that the flagship High Court safeguard will be replaced by what has been labelled by media outlets as a ‘death tzar’ who will oversee panels, dubbed the ‘death panels’, that will include a more junior legal figure, a social worker and a psychiatrist.
Shah condemned the removal of the Bill’s flagship safeguard for having “weakened the Bill”, and described its replacement as “a story for the birds”, saying “It’s fundamentally changed everything, generally is like the court, there’s no judicial oversight. The idea that it’s judge-led now is just, it’s a story for the birds, really, because it’s not judge-led”.
“You’ve got a judge who’s going to be a commissioner, and there’s no oversight on that commissioner now, because you’ve taken the commissioner, you’ve taken out the oversight from the actual chief medical officers. It has actually weakened the bill”.
Shah also said “There’s too many loopholes. I don’t think this bill has [provided a safety net] in any way, shape or form”.
Over 300 amendments to protect the vulnerable were rejected
During Committee Stage, Shah emerged as one of the strongest advocates of groups at greatest risk from the legislation. Shah was especially concerned about vulnerable women being coerced into having assisted suicide saying “I would rather stay on the side of caution… when it comes to domestic abuse, coercion, and the power imbalance in a relationship”. She also argued that where there is power, control and vulnerability, abuse can thrive.
She also condemned the Bill for failing to protect the most vulnerable, warning that it overlooks systemic inequalities in end-of-life care. “If we want a Rolls-Royce service, and if this is to be the best Bill in the world, it cannot ignore the most vulnerable in society”, she stated. Despite attempts to brush off criticism, Shah reiterated that the Bill was not fit for purpose saying “I would slightly beg to differ with my hon. Friend in terms of making progress in the way that I would like to have seen”.
When growing concerns emerged over the portrayal of assisted suicide as a form of healthcare, Shah reminded the Committee that the core principle of medical practice is to preserve life and avoid causing harm. This, she noted, is “why the vast majority of those who work in end-of-life care oppose this legislation”.
Leadbeater and her Bill supporters rejected over 300 amendments that sought to strengthen safeguards in the Bill and protect vulnerable groups. Shah rejected Leadbeater’s claims that Committee Stage has made “already the strongest assisted [suicide] legislation anywhere in the world even safer and more robust”, saying “We set out to improve it. I think it’s got worse on lots of issues… The bill we have today is weaker than the one that we voted on in November 2024”.
Shah also highlighted a list of unknowns regarding the implementation of the Bill, criticising the lack of detail as “not good enough”. She said “We have no idea what the [assisted suicide] service will look like. We don’t have a model. We don’t know who could provide this service, who couldn’t provide the service. Is it going to be hospices? Is it going to be charities? Is it going to be for-profit? That’s not good enough”.
“I ain’t having my old man being coerced and feeling that he’s a burden and he has to go”
Shah’s criticisms of the amended Bill are the latest in a string of strongly worded negative comments regarding the Committee stage from a variety of sources, including MPs and major newspapers. A group of Labour MPs launched a scathing attack on Kim Leadbeater’s Bill in a letter to colleagues, calling it “irredeemably flawed and not fit to become law” and pointing to the emergence of “significant new risks” during the recently completed Committee Stage. Committee member Danny Kruger MP was equally scathing about the amended Bill at the conclusion of the Committee Stage, saying “This is not the Bill the public thought they were getting. It contradicts the NHS Act and the Hippocratic Oath. It’s got worse, not better, in committee”.
There have also been notable strongly worded calls from major newspapers, The Times and The Daily Telegraph, for the Bill to be scrapped. The Times summed up its position in an editorial that carried the headline “The dangerously flawed assisted dying legislation should be abandoned”, whilst The Telegraph’s headline was even stronger, saying “The vile assisted suicide Bill is on its last legs. Now let’s kill it off”.
The New Statesman also reported that Shah has had conversations with “quite a few” Labour MPs who “have changed their minds from being in favour to against” the Bill. Shah said “Somebody very bluntly said, ‘Oh no, I’m definitely not voting for this. I ain’t having my old man being coerced and feeling that he’s a burden and he has to go. I ain’t having that’”.
Spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said “It is becoming increasingly clear that the flawed and unbalanced Committee Stage has considerably weakened this already disastrous Bill”.
“Committee member Naz Shah is the latest in a long line of critics to expose Kim Leadbeater’s supposed safeguards as an utter fiction. Along with her colleagues Danny Kruger, Rebecca Paul and Sarah Olney, Shah has worked tirelessly to painstakingly shine a light on the many dangerous components of this Bill, which MPs must now reject at Third Reading”.
