“This process is flawed!” Labour’s Naz Shah told the House of Commons. “This is not how we make legislation.” She was wearing a long cream jacket that resembled a trench coat, leaving the impression that she had just dashed in off the street to warn MPs they were making a terrible mistake.
The chamber was full, and it was a Friday, which meant the subject was Death. Kim Leadbeater’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was back for more scrutiny. This may be one of the most consequential acts of this parliament, and whatever else you can say about MPs, no one can accuse them of not taking it seriously. Whether you can say the same of the government is another question.
Watching Parliamentary debates is generally like watching a tennis match played inside gelatine, with the subject very slowly batted back from one side of the chamber to the other in a predictable manner. MPs on the government benches support the government, those on the opposition benches don’t. This bill cuts across all that, with divisions within parties as deep as they usually are between them.
That isn’t the only unusual feature of the debate. Almost all laws are introduced by the government, drafted by experts trying to implement ministers’ wishes. But the government takes no view on Death (although one assumes ministers are against it in general). The result is that Leadbeater, a backbench Labour MP, finds herself in charge of managing the bill.
The most skilled and experienced parliamentarian would have struggled to navigate these shoals
Leadbeater is a jolly speaker, a former lecturer in physical health and personal trainer. It’s easy to imagine her in a tracksuit, chivvying you to just give her ten more press-ups. She gives the impression of trying to encourage even those MPs who disagree with her, nodding along as they discuss the momentous matter before them. She also gives the very distinct impression of being completely out of her depth on all this.
Shah was furious because she had been told that morning, after the debate had started, that Leadbeater had accepted one of her proposed amendments to the bill, but also that the wording was going to change in a way that Shah had yet to see. Further, Shah had previously been told by ministers that this amendment was unworkable. Was that still their view? What had changed? No one could tell her. “This is literally a matter of life and death!” Shah declared. “If this bill passes and it doesn’t have the safeguards, there’s no coming back from that decision.”
Sitting behind Shah, Leadbeater looked a little overwhelmed. As she should. This is a bill that fundamentally changes the relationship between the public, doctors and the state. It will reconfigure the NHS and the hospice system. It’s not hard to imagine that it will clog up the courts with challenges from people who want to die or want to stop loved ones from ending their lives. Mistakes will mean that the wrong people die or, from another perspective, that the right people don’t. Leadbetter told us she’d “worked closely with an outstanding team of civil servants”, but this is a policy that needs a whole department working on it.
And though the government has given the bill enough time to pass, it hasn’t allowed nearly the amount of scrutiny that many MPs want. A full chamber was given just over four hours to go through amendments on Friday. There will be another session next month.
If the usual geography of the chamber is no longer a useful guide, we can start to see a new one. MPs clustered into alliances on their own benches. The Conservative Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst, sat next to Kit Malthouse, was in favour of the bill. He spoke for doctors who are quite confident that they know what they’re doing and don’t need MPs to interfere. This view was less popular in the chamber than he seems to have expected it to be, with multiple Labour MPs rising to tell him that they and their constituents had often concluded that doctor did not, in fact, know best, especially when it came to disabled people. “We are at real danger of treating our clinicians as though they have no care for their patients,” Shastri-Hurst replied, a little wounded.
The most skilled and experienced parliamentarian would have struggled to navigate these shoals. Opening the debate, Leadbeater was asked about Esther Rantzen’s helpful letter suggesting that MPs were opposing the bill because of “undeclared personal religious beliefs”. (In my experience of politics, undeclared personal secular beliefs are generally more common, but Rantzen is probably OK with those.)
“I haven’t seen those comments,” Leadbeater said, always the best answer for a politician who doesn’t want to talk about something. Perhaps she hasn’t been following the news around her own bill very closely.
Florence Eshalomi, whose personal religious beliefs are on her website and would, until 1829, have prevented her from sitting in parliament, described Rantzen’s letter as “frankly insulting”, which shows she, at least, had read it. “Members with valid concerns about this bill are not raising it because of some ideology or religious belief,” she said. “It is because we recognise that if this bill passes, it may impact everyone, not just those who wish to die.”
The debate was supposed to be about the detail of amendments, and MPs, starting with Leadbeater, were repeatedly told off for rehearsing questions of principle. But of course an MP’s view of the detail ultimately depends on their view of the principle: if they think assisted dying is a good thing, allowing the sick to pass quickly with less pain, then they want to remove obstacles to it. If they think it’s dangerous, they want to make it as hard as possible.
When it came to the vote, MPs milled about in the chamber. Oliver Dowden was wearing tails, giving the impression he had decided to dress up, appropriately, as an undertaker. David Davis was wearing some kind of medal around his neck. It was gold, on a red ribbon, and I choose to believe it was for swimming 10m without armbands. Diane Abbott, in a grey trouser suit and sparkly silver trainers, could have stepped off the set of a Roger Moore-era Bond film. Nigel Farage and Lee Anderson found themselves queueing behind Rupert Lowe, and so hung back, giving him a yard’s distance. One senses they may be able to see the case for helping some elderly people to die.
As the debate closed, Tom Tugendhat (who knows a thing or two about death, from his time in the army, which he doesn’t like to discuss), described his experience as a Conservative minister bringing in the National Security Act. “That went through this House for two years,” he said. “It required an entire department’s preparation behind it.” This bill, he went on, “allows the state to kill someone”.
On the other side of the chamber, Leadbeater’s face took on a pained expression. Supporters of the bill have been marked throughout the process by their squeamishness at the language around what they’re doing. They should make a concerted effort to rebrand death. “Assisted Going Before”, perhaps, or the “Very Poorly Grown-Ups (Going To Live On A Farm) Bill”.
The vote revealed that the bill’s supporters still have the numbers. You wouldn’t bet against it passing at this point. If we’re looking for a metaphor on Keir Starmer’s government, we may struggle to do better than the most important piece of legislation on his watch being one he has nothing to do with.
