Rosie Duffield

Rarely do we debate legislation that represents such a seismic shift in the relationships between individuals, the state, health providers and civic society. There is so much at stake. When Members believe strongly that a Bill is flawed and could be abused, resulting in serious harm, we have an absolute duty to implore others not to simply let it pass and hope for the best, but to consider it fully and deeply and to accept that our duty is first and foremost to protect lives. The potential consequences of poorly drafted legislation without robust safeguards are ultimately the responsibility of every single Member in this Chamber. I come to this debate wearing several hats. I come as the representative for Canterbury, the home of this country’s Christian faith. Rather than removing that aspect from this debate, as others may have chosen to do, I must consider the views of the Church, and the archbishop has made her view clear again this week. There have also been representations from our sizeable mosque and that community. I come as a daughter who, this week last year, was sitting at my father’s bedside as he was dying from early onset Alzheimer’s, which so cruelly began when he was not much older than I am now. I come also as the partner of a filmmaker who directed the BBC documentary “Better Off Dead?”, which was led by Liz Carr and based on her decades of disability rights activism. I was already aware of Liz’s work through her Not Dead Yet campaign, but the opportunity to learn much more by discussing this subject at home in depth for so many months was invaluable. Lifelong campaigner Baroness Jane Campbell has seen off so many attempts to pass assisted suicide legislation in the other place that she likens it to groundhog day. In the documentary, she says: “People are decent, kind. They think that they’re doing us a great favour by giving us this choice. But what they don’t realise is how deadly that choice can be.” It is worth repeating that not a single disabled rights organisation or professional body supports this legislation. If this place were truly representative of the UK’s population, there would be almost 100 physically disabled Members of Parliament, but we are nowhere near that.