MPs support legal guidance over cases of assisted suicide

MPs have backed the Director of Public Prosecutions over guidance on when to prosecute cases of assisted suicide.

The Commons agreed without a vote to endorse Keir Starmer’s “realistic and compassionate” guidelines, produced two years ago following a campaign by right-to-die campaigner Debbie Purdy, from Bradford.

After a five-hour debate, MPs also agreed to a call to encourage the development of specialist palliative care and hospice provision for the terminally ill.

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Leading the debate, Conservative MP Richard Ottaway (Croydon South) said the guidance, which outlines how those with good motives who helped a loved-one end their life should not be pursued by the law, was “realistic and compassionate”.

He said a recent poll found 82 per cent of people supported the guidelines and it was not in the “public interest” to prosecute someone for ending a friend or relative’s life.

Labour MP Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) supported legalising assisted suicide after his cancer-stricken, 87-year-old father gassed himself last July.

Fighting back tears, Mr Blomfield said his father did not want to end his life relying on 24-hour care like many of his friends.

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The MP added: “He wasn’t in pain but he couldn’t face the indignity of that lingering, degrading death. If the law had made it possible he could, and I am sure he would, have shared his plans and he would have been able to say goodbye.

“He would have been able to die with his family around him and not alone in a carbon monoxide filled garage. He, and many more like him, deserve better.”

Dignity in Dying last night welcomed the MPs’ decision which chief executive Sarah Wootton described as “a landmark in the evolution of a more compassionate approach to end-of-life decision making.”

She added: There is no appetite from the public or the courts to prosecute those who compassionately assist a loved one to die, at their request. Parliament has shown a consensus of support for this approach, as well as recognising that we must continue to develop end-of-life care for all.”