Parliament is to re-examine the question of helping terminally ill people to die, 10 years after the possibility of making it legal was rejected by the House of Lords Select Committee on Medical Ethics. The House of Lords Liaison Committee has recommended that a new ad hoc select committee be set up to consider changes in public perception of the issue and the experience of other countries.
The Patient (Assisted Dying) Bill was put before the House of Lords as a private member's bill by the cross party peer Lord Joffe in February and was the subject of preliminary debate in June. During that debate three members of the original select committee, Baronesses Jay, Warnock, and Flather, said they now supported a change in the law. A record number of peers attended the second reading of the bill, with opinion roughly evenly divided for and against.
The House of Lords Liaison Committee's report said: "Almost ten years have elapsed since the subject was considered by the Select Committee on Medical Ethics which reported in 1994. Since then other countries have introduced such legislation and public opinion in the United Kingdom has become more engaged in the issue.
"We consider that a Select Committee of this House would be well placed to consider major ethical issues of this kind and accordingly we recommend the appointment of an ad hoc Select Committee upon the Bill.
"The Bill will have to be reintroduced in the next [parliamentary] session, read a second time and committed to a Select Committee. Accordingly, we recommend that the Committee begin its work after the Easter recess."
Lord Joffe told the Liaison Committee that there had been a swing in public opinion after the much publicised case of Diane Pretty, who died in May last year three days after the European Court of Human Rights ruled that her husband could not legally help her to die (BMJ 2002;324:1055).
He said any committee examining the question of assisted death should investigate whether recent polls showing that 80% of the public supported assisted dying accurately reflected public opinion.
The committee will also study the current experience of assisted dying in the Netherlands and Oregon, where right to die legislation has been introduced since the House of Lords medical ethics committee considered the question in 1994. Lord Joffe argues that the Dutch government's Remmelink Report, published earlier this year, found no evidence of vulnerable people being put at risk or of increases in voluntary euthanasia in the last five years.
Deborah Annetts, chief executive of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society, said: "The government's current position is based on evidence which is 10 years out of date. I hope the select committee will consider new evidence from other countries where assisted dying laws are working very well. Hundreds of terminally ill people have contacted us to voice their support for the Patient (Assisted Dying) Bill, and I am delighted the Lords are taking their concerns seriously."