THE Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill was lodged in Holyrood last week. Sponsored by LibDem MSP Liam McArthur, the bill builds on the work of the late Margo MacDonald in past parliaments. If passed, the bill would create a legal framework for terminally ill adults to be provided with assistance to end their own life in Scotland.
The legislation defines a terminal illness as “an advanced and progressive disease, illness or condition from which they are unable to recover and that can reasonably be expected to cause their premature death.”
Only adults who have been living in Scotland for 12 months – registered with a doctor, and with legal capacity – will be eligible. Under the proposals, people seeking assistance to end their lives would make a fully witnessed first declaration that they want to be provided with lawful assistance to die.
Two doctors must then certify they really are terminally ill, eligible, and are making this declaration “voluntarily” without “coercion or pressure” from any other person. Assuming all these tests are met, there is then a two-week reflection period before the doctor may provide the terminally ill adult with an approved substance “with which the adult may end their own life”.
The current legal position in Scotland is a bit more complex than many people recognise. The Suicide Act 1961 abolished the crime of attempting suicide – partly explaining why some folk still use that archaic formulation of “committing suicide” – but introduced the new offence of “aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring” another person’s death, with maximum penalties of up to 14 years in prison.
The 1961 Act has been revisited over the years since. The modern offence holds if you do anything “capable of encouraging or assisting” another person with the intention of encouraging or helping them to end their life.
It’s under these rules that people south of the Border who help their loved ones to board aeroplanes to Switzerland – or who put the........