Baroness Berger (Lab)

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 31 in the name of my noble friend Lady Ritchie. It would clarify that the request for assistance to end one’s life must come from the terminally ill person, leaving no room for doubt over whether someone else is able to make the request for them. This may seem like a statement of the obvious, given that eligibility under the Bill depends on both a clear, settled and informed wish to die and an absence of coercion. But there are situations where it is possible to imagine the request being initiated by another person who claims to be speaking on the ill person’s behalf, and an assessing doctor being persuaded to go along with it. The Bill contains a number of provisions that are designed to allow another person a substantive role in the process, from the independent advocate who helps a terminally ill person to engage with their options, to the proxy who can sign a first or second declaration on their behalf. It is not difficult to envision such a person taking it on themselves to tell a doctor that the ill person is interested in having a preliminary discussion under Clause 5, or being the one to make an appointment that they explicitly say is for the purposes of a first declaration under Clause 8. Neither scenario is explicitly ruled out by the Bill. Of course, there are no limits specified to the role of independent advocates in particular. This is just one example of the many things that are not in the Bill and are left to be decided through regulations later on. We might even imagine a partner, relative or friend purporting to speak on behalf of an ill person telling the doctor that he or she is shy, exhausted or overwhelmed, when in reality they are acting in their own interests.