Assisted suicide could be permitted for those who wish to end their lives to ease financial burdens on their families under Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide Bill.
During the assisted suicide Bill Committee’s debate scrutinising her Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill at the beginning of this month, Leadbeater was asked multiple times whether people who sought assisted suicide to enable relatives to make cost savings would be approved. She refused to rule out this possibility in her replies.
In a revealing exchange, Danny Kruger MP, one of the Bill’s principal opponents, asked Leadbeater whether she would “be content if somebody who had capacity chose an assisted death for the purpose of saving their family money?”. Leadbeater replied saying the situation was more complicated than he suggested.
He followed up by asking “If they have been judged to have capacity, choosing to have the assisted death in order to save their family money would be acceptable under her Bill, would it not?”.
Leadbeater again refused to rule out this possibility, saying “We are oversimplifying a complex situation and a difficult conversation” and calling for “expertise” that would be achieved “by providing serious amounts of training around this issue”.
Pressing his point for the final time, Kruger said “I want to hear the hon. Lady confirm that under the Bill as currently drafted, after all these conversations have taken place, as long as the doctor cannot find evidence of coercion, they would be obliged to approve the assisted death, as would the judge and the judicial panel. If that is the case, and they conclude that a person has capacity and there is no evidence of coercion, no matter what conversations go on—if the person wants to do it in order to save their family money—the doctors and the judges would have to say yes”.
After Leadbeater prevaricated once more, Rebecca Paul MP also attempted to elicit a specific response from her on this point “[W]ould someone be allowed to access assisted dying if it was clear that they had capacity and their reason for it was simply not to cost their relatives financial expense or be a burden[?] It is important to be honest about what the Bill does. Is the answer to that yes?”. Leadbeater again refused to give a straight answer, saying “it comes down to a question of autonomy, dignity and choice for patients”.
Feeling like a burden “not a minor issue”
Critics have blasted Leadbeater’s refusal to rule out people seeking assisted suicide ending their lives in order to ease financial burdens on their families. Professor Katherine Sleeman, a specialist in palliative care, posted on X “If we want to legalise assisted dying, we have to accept that people will do it because they feel they are a burden”.
“In Oregon about 50% of people having [assisted suicide] cite feeling a burden. It’s not a minor issue. I wish bill supporters would just ‘own’ this rather than deflect”.
Official figures from Oregon confirm Sleeman’s point. Of the thousands of people who have ended their lives by assisted suicide in Oregon since 1997, 47.1% listed “Burden on family, friends/caregivers” among their end-of-life concerns.
Speaking of his back-and-forth with Leadbeater, Danny Kruger said “[Rebecca Paul]and I managed to get Kim Leadbeater to admit that under her Bill a person would be able to get an Assisted Death for the sole reason of saving their relatives money”.
Responding to the video, journalist Dan Hodges registered his concerns, saying it was a “very, very important exchange. Kim Leadbeater effectively admits under her Bill people could end their life solely because they believe they are a financial burden on their family. That simply isn’t acceptable”.
Responding to the same video, GP Dr Katie Musgrave posted “If you are in any doubt as to what the [assisted suicide] bill permits: a patient with a terminal diagnosis – with capacity, without coercion – could ask to be killed purely in order to save their relatives money, & facilitate a convenient death. This will happen”.
Spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said “It is a chilling reality that those who are seeking assisted suicide will, so long as they meet the other requirements, be able to do so to ease financial burdens on their families under the Leadbeater Bill”.
“Sadly the danger that people will request assisted suicide because they feel they are a burden is all too real, as heartbreaking statistics show us. For those who have ended their lives in the most recent year for which data is available, 45.3% cited being a burden in Canada, 43.3% did so in Oregon, 59% in Washington and 35.2% did so in Western Australia”.
“We would be naïve to believe that the same could not happen here if this reckless Bill, which is a disaster in waiting, becomes law. It should be scrapped immediately”.
