Andrew Fergusson reports

Andrew Fergusson

You might think that a term as bland as 'assistance' was referring to the medical and social help that caring families, caring communities, and caring health and social services should provide to those dying, whether they be the long-term disabled, the acutely sick, or the very elderly.

To Margo MacDonald, an independent Member of the Scottish Parliament, it meant that a terminally ill or 'permanently physically incapacitated' resident in Scotland had the right to demand from doctors 'assistance' with dying. The nature of this assistance was never spelt out - it would have applied to assisting suicide by providing lethal medication to be swallowed, or to acts of euthanasia by lethal injection. Come to that, it could have applied to a push off the top of Ben Nevis.

Resoundingly rejected

Her End of Life (Assistance) Bill had enough support to begin its journey through the Scottish Parliament (health policies are devolved so Scotland could have gone its own way here), but was overwhelmingly opposed in public consultation by doctors and others, both groups and individuals. It was opposed 5-1 by the parliamentary committee which considered it, and after several hours' debate by the whole Parliament on 1 December, was resoundingly rejected by 85-16, with two abstentions. The BBC reports that in her speech Margo MacDonald especially blamed the alliance Care Not Killing for the defeat that was inevitably to come.

CNK campaign director Peter Saunders blogged, 'The key argument that decided this vote and the similar votes in the House of Lords in 2006 and 2009 is a simple one. The right to die can so easily become the duty to die. Vulnerable people who are sick, elderly or disabled can so easily feel pressure, whether real or imagined, to end their lives so as not to be a burden on others. Parliament's first responsibility is to protect the vulnerable and that is what they have voted to do today.'

There will be smarter campaigns to change the UK law, and on 30 November Lord Falconer launched his allegedly independent Commission on Assisted Dying. The Telegraph reported 'critics raised concerns over the commission's transparency, independence and objectivity' and Peter Saunders amplified this danger with an analysis of the Commission's membership. Yet another medical organisation joining the ranks campaigning so that doctors could legally end the lives of patients in their care is 'Health Professionals for Change'.

Whose life is it anyway?

Why is all this happening? There are two main reasons. First is the choice agenda - the rise and rise of 'patient autonomy', or self determination, perhaps best summed up in the title of the play: Whose life is it anyway? As a Christian doctor, I answer that - first it is God's, secondly it belongs to the service of other people, and last of all it is 'mine'. Now, Christian arguments like that are not going to work in secular, multicultural Britain today - but I think we should still begin there. We then need to answer the autonomy argument with its own language, and as Peter Saunders argues above, civilised societies protect vulnerable majorities from vociferous minorities.

The other reason for the drive to euthanasia is that medicine has been so successful technologically that many people towards the ends of their lives fear they will suffer weeks and weeks of drawn-out indignity hooked up to tubes and machines. My profession needs to remember that life has a natural end, and while continuing to campaign against those who wish to change the law to bring about unnatural ends, needs to stop inappropriate over-treatment at the end of life.

End of life assistance? Yes, but let's use our wonderful medical knowledge and our rich provision of caring services to assist people to cope as they reach the end of their lives, and perhaps assist them to 'prepare to meet their Maker'. Let us not hasten their exit. Let us care, not kill.