Former Prime Minister Lord David Cameron has supported strikes to legalize assisted dying for terminally unwell adults.
In an article in The Times, Lord Cameron stated that though he had opposed strikes to legalize assisted dying up to now, he believed the present proposals “It's not about ending life, however shortening dying,
At first his main concern was that “weak individuals could possibly be pressured to hasten their very own dying”, but he said he believed the current proposal included “enough safeguards” to prevent this. Are.
Lord Cameron has become the first former PM to support this bill after gordon brownBaroness Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss all said they were against it.
Brown, a long-time critic of assisted dying, told BBC Radio 4's Sunday programme: “Assisted dying legal guidelines, irrespective of how well-intentioned, change society's attitudes in direction of the aged, the critically unwell and the disabled. will change, even when solely unconsciously, and I’m additionally afraid the caring occupation will lose one thing irreplaceable – significantly their standing as carers.”
Brown stood down as an MP in 2015 so will not be voted out but his voice still carries weight in the Labor Party.
However, Lord Cameron, appointed as Foreign Secretary by Rishi Sunak, pledged to vote for the bill when it reaches the House of Lords.
The last time the House of Commons voted on legalizing assisted dying in 2015, he did not record the vote.
The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill will allow terminally ill people who are likely to die within six months to seek help to end their lives, if two doctors and a High Court judge Verify that they are eligible and that they have made their decision voluntarily.
Labor MP Kim Leadbeater, introducing the bill, said that “the established order isn’t match for function” and that her proposals could prevent “very painful, very distressing deaths”.
Current laws in Britain prevent people from seeking medical aid to die.
The bill would require people who apply for assisted dying to:
- Be over 18 years of age, resident in England and Wales and registered with a GP for at least 12 months
- Have the mental capacity to make a decision about ending your life
- Express a “clear, settled and knowledgeable” desire to be free from coercion or coercion at each stage of the process.
Writing in The Times, Lord Cameron said: “Many of those safeguards shall be acquainted from earlier proposals.
“But this new bill further protects vulnerable people, including making coercion a criminal offence.”
He added, “Will this legislation lead to a meaningful reduction in human suffering? It is very difficult for me to argue that the answer to this question is anything other than 'yes'.”
With inputs from BBC
