Assisted suicide bill moves closer

Published on Thursday 3 December 2009 21:30

A BILL to legalise assisted deaths in Scotland is due to be laid down in Holyrood today.

Independent Lothians MSP Margo MacDonald will unveil the full details of the bill in January having completed a long consultation process.

But even before the parliament's legal staff have been able to check that it is competent, pro-life groups attacked the bill for potentially leading to elderly or badly disabled people being pushed into taking their lives early.

The Care Not Killing Alliance, a coalition of groups against euthanasia, said: "If Margo MacDonald's bill becomes law they will come under real or imagined pressure to end their lives prematurely. Rather than pushing people towards assisted suicide or euthanasia, we should be assuring them that they are not a burden and working to provide effective palliative care."

Ms MacDonald suffers from an increasingly debilitating form of Parkinson's disease and has admitted she would like the option of taking her own life.

Cases throughout the UK have raised the question of whether members of the family who take people to other countries to die should or would be prosecuted.

The parents of Daniel James were investigated for taking him to Switzerland to take his own life. He was unable to cope after a rugby accident left him disabled.

And the Law Lords recently ruled in favour of campaigner Dianne Pretty that the Crown Prosecution Service in England needs to clarify when it would prosecute.