A grim development supported by people who criticise any pushback on their approach to Ukraine as wanting more lives to end.

Pro-Bill Lewis Atkinson rejects proposed safeguard for people with mental disorders, claiming “We should not be preventing anyone from accessing an option merely because of a mild element of depression”. Would he take this approach with someone considering non-assisted suicide?

If a patient says to a doctor - I am thinking of taking my own life - the right response is “Can we talk about why you feel like that?” Not “Can I check your mental capacity?”. Leadbeater’s bill proposes a negligent refusal to discuss thoughts of suicide.

Assisted suicide panel in numbers:

Naz Shah: challenges Kim Leadbeater on her distinction between suicide and AD. Was a Samaritan, two suicide attempts in early years, battled with mental health. To suggest there's a difference between someone with terminal illness and want this act, and someone who want to commit

Naz Shah MP (Naz Shah MP) courageously speaks about her own suicide attempts. She resolutely does not believe there's a distinction between a non-terminally ill and a terminally ill person feeling suicidal.

I apologised to the members of the Assisted Dying Bill committee tonight as I had to leave early. I didn’t want to but had to because my hearing aids need to recharge after 15 hours use and without them I cannot hear or take part in the committee. Hearing isn’t a choice for me.

This is how the TIA Bill committee accommodates it's disabled members Make of that what you will

This is what Kim Leadbeater thinks “Parliament at its best” is—forcing out a disabled MP through attrition.

Brain blown. The government and Kim Leadbeater keep saying don’t put things on face of bill, rely instead on codes of practice. But the Committee has just voted to say that nobody (doctors etc) has to comply with those codes of practice. It’s all to be discretionary.

The most consequential act of any Labour Government, arguably of any Government - undone by a private members bill and an MP elected in 2021. Heart feels so very heavy that this is how it has been done. Mark D'Arcy Hansard Society spotted it would have to happen. Now it has.

A recurring phenomenon of pro-bill MPs saying they’ll table significant amendments and then never getting round to it.

‘Finally, “O God, our help in ages past” was sung — a rare experience, never to be forgotten. The six hundred men who govern England lifted the tune to the roof.’

Anneliese Dodds MP (Anneliese Dodds): In the Netherlands in 2010, there were two cases of assisted dying for psychiatric suffering, in 2023 there were 138... The slippery slope is real.

Amendment defeated 279 v 243. Looks like there will be no hospice, nor care home, where you can be certain ending the life of the terminally ill will not be suggested nor normalised.

Today the Observer has published an extraordinary piece, which I think they view as a romantic case for assisted dying, but which is, in fact, a textbook case of how doctors subvert the rules to help patients without any terminal illness whatsoever to die by suicide. It could

So you're saying that although doctors make fatal mistakes, we should allow them to actively kill patients?

Still, at least Esther Rantzen is happy, which is the important thing.

Someone's going to have a heart attack when they next hear one of the Psalms read in church....

A remarkable fact about the Assisted (accelerated) Dying bill. 👇