A Rushed, Unscrutinised Bill

Madeline Grant writes:

For a scenario so macabre, the assisted suicide debate prompted a surprising amount of back-slapping. Kim Leadbeater and Jess Phillips embraced each other while MPs fell over themselves to say how wonderful, how dignified their mix of emotional anecdote and outright deceit had been.

Front of the queue was the Bill’s sponsor, Leadbeater herself, who hailed this as “Parliament at its best”. This may be partly because she now has the right to assemble the committee which will scrutinise the Bill. If that sounds like a recipe for a stitch-up then that’s because it is.

The announcement of the committee ought to banish any lingering doubt about Leadbeater being a bad faith actor. At 330 votes in favour to 275 against the Second Reading equated to, roughly, a 56/44 split within the Commons. Including the two ministers appointed to the committee and Leadbeater herself, the committee split equates to 14 in favour, nine against – a 60/40 split. Basic parliamentary arithmetic should have resulted in a 13-10 committee division.

Subtler but more invidious problems emerge when you consider who Leadbeater has hand-picked for the committee and the interests they might be seen to represent.

Bill supporter and Palliative Care minister Stephen Kinnock was appointed, even though the palliative care profession overwhelmingly resists any legal change. Every single user-led disability organisation publicly opposes the Bill, yet the only disabled MP appointed to the committee is a supporter. Every single medically-qualified MP on the committee is in favour, as is every appointee with legal expertise. The latter is quite an ironic omission, given that Leadbeater’s claims or statements prompted a phone call from the highest echelons of the judiciary to accuse her of misrepresenting their support, which forced an embarrassing U-turn and point of order in the Chamber.

Leadbeater has, I suspect, done what passive-aggressive people often do; framing all forms of disagreement as “disrespectful” and “not constructive”. Those who spoke most passionately against her appear to have been excluded on the implicit grounds that they can’t be trusted to police their own tone. In truth, it is simply further avoidance of scrutiny. With the exception of Danny Kruger, the debate’s most eloquent voices have been sidelined. Among them are Labour MPs Florence Eshalomi, Dame Meg Hillier, and Jess Asato – the latter having cited fears about coercion, informed by years spent working with victims of domestic violence.

Still more indefensible is the omission of York Central MP Rachael Maskell, who is not only head of the All-Party Parliamentary Groups for “Ageing and Older People” and “Dying Well”, but one of just two sitting MPs who participated in the Health Select Committee’s last major study on assisted suicide.

Runnymede and Weybridge MP Dr Ben Spencer publicly asked to be included. As a medical doctor with a PhD in decision-making capacity, he might appear doubly-qualified, bringing expertise in two distinct areas (ethics and medicine) which alone might justify inclusion. So naturally he’s been put on the “naughty step”. What reason can there be for the exclusion of these MPs?

One of Leadbeater’s allies recently said the quiet bit out loud, “we won the first round and have to make sure the anti-campaign aren’t blocking this bill.” Such briefing undermines supporters’ repeated assurances that critical MPs would have ample time and opportunity to propose amendments and assuage concerns. What was sold as a starting point now looks more like a battering ram.

The presence of two Government ministers on the committee – both on the yes side – is itself problematic. Not only could this be potentially intimidating to Labour committee members, it sends a not-so-subtle message to all party backbenchers about No 10’s “neutrality” before the next vote. You would expect there to be one minister involved with a Private Members’ Bill (PMB) – having two, both in favour, feels like overkill.

Six out of nine committee opponents are backbench MPs from the 2024 intake. No doubt they will work hard to scrutinise the bill, but their lack of legislative experience is undeniable. Given the expertise of some who were sidelined, it looks downright suspicious. Hillier, for example, is a former minister, who has chaired two select committees and entered Parliament in 2005.

We are beginning to understand the limitations of the PMB structure for introducing complex, consequential policies. Not only is there no mechanism to prevent sponsors handpicking their committee, a crisis of accountability is emerging.

While pro-voices waft away questions of funding and practicality by saying “these are details for the Government to decide further down the line”, when asked about those details, ministers plead neutrality since it’s not their Bill anyway. Rachel Reeves repeatedly pulled this trick when asked basic logistical questions about whether taxpayers might be on the hook for additional costs associated with an “assisted dying service”.

This matters, because to dodge scrutiny will, like any watered-down safety procedure, result in more harm than is necessary. A rushed, unscrutinised Bill will have catastrophic consequences when its safeguards inevitably fail; consequences for which Leadbeater and her allies will be directly responsible. Apologies if that’s not a “constructive” or “respectful” thing to say, but it’s also true.