Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Debate between Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Friday 21st November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)]

My Lords, I support the amendments to Clause 1 in this group. I speak in particular to Amendment 48 in my name. This seeks to strengthen the safeguards against someone being coerced into an assisted death by removing the words “by any other person” from Clause 1(2)(b). This would extend the notion of coercion by recognising that coercion or pressure can come from a multitude of places—an institution, a circumstance or another individual. I am sure there is agreement across your Lordships’ Committee that nobody should feel obliged to opt for an assisted death. This amendment aims to strengthen and clarify the eligibility criteria in the Bill in recognition that they are perhaps its most important safeguard.

I have deep concerns, as many of us do, about how we protect vulnerable people from unnecessary, unwanted death. I am especially anxious that we should be aware of the risk of coercion in all its forms, which is an issue that I raised during Second Reading. This includes somebody who feels coerced through a lack of real choice.

The National Audit Office’s recent report into the state of the palliative and end-of-life care sector is stark. As we know, funding is stretched and provision is disparate. As things stand, there is a lack of real choice for many people about the end of life. The knowledge of this could easily be internalised by people, leaving terminally ill patients in certain regions or who are part of particularly vulnerable marginalised populations feeling that they have no choice but assisted dying, whether or not another person is explicitly pushing this.

Therefore, my Amendment 48 seeks to ensure that such cases are not left out of the Bill’s definition of coercion. I ask my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer, in his summing up, to give consideration to this, so that it remains possible to detect and prevent any death that the person has not freely chosen.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I do not like this Bill, but I am here, like many other Members of this House, to agree on amendments that will make this a better Bill, and I hope it will be effective.

When my father died, the family nanny, who had also been his housekeeper, needed somewhere to live, and my brothers and I paid for her to live in a very nice care home, where she was entirely happy, until I went to see her. On each occasion, she said to me, “I shouldn’t be alive. I ought to die. It is not right that you and your brothers are having to pay for me”. I have this direct knowledge. She was perfectly happy when I was not there and, of course, we continued to look after her until she died.

But the Bill, once it is passed, is absolutely certain to be enlarged in all sorts of ways, as happened with other Bills in other countries once they became law. There are various reasons why it would be a good thing to enlarge it. For example, it seems to me bitterly unfair that those with locked-in syndromes such as motor neurone disease would be extremely unlikely to benefit from the Bill in the last six months, because many—those I have known—have been unable to do anything themselves in the last six months. The word “encouragement” is absolutely crucial. It does not have to be coercion. It does not have to be abuse. It could be nice people listening to a loved one and realising that they are saying, “I ought to die”, and consequently saying, “Yes, why not?” That would be extremely unjust.

Northern Ireland Protocol Bill

Debate between Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Committee stage
Wednesday 2nd November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to support Amendments 21B, 21C and 23C in the name of my noble friend Lord Hain. It is a pleasure to follow him as well as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, and the noble Lord, Lord Kerr.

I am in absolutely no doubt, and all the research indicates, that the protocol is essential to allowing the lights to stay on in Northern Ireland and on the island of Ireland—because we have been in a single electricity market since 2007. The evidence is there to suggest the support of young people for ending political and economic uncertainty, plus their support for action on climate change. I declare an interest as a member of your Lordships’ protocol committee; we took evidence in Northern Ireland and from community groups, and the most important issue to them was not the protocol: it was addressing the cost of living crisis and the cost of doing business crisis.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, referred to the fact that a significant proportion of people are opposed to the protocol. I acknowledge that there is unionist opposition to the protocol, but I also acknowledge that a large majority of Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly who wrote to the then Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, indicated their support for the protocol—and, in so doing, indicated their support for an end to that political and economic uncertainty. One way in which we can have economic certainty in Northern Ireland is through the continuation of the single electricity market, which deals with issues to do with decarbonisation and climate change. It is essential that the lights keep functioning, but it is fundamental to our businesses on the island of Ireland.

It is worth noting that the protocol provisions addressing the single electricity market on the island seek to ensure the continued operation of that wholesale electricity market from the end of the transition period. That is to be achieved by Northern Ireland continuing to align with a number of European Union directives on wholesale electricity. A report from the House of Commons some years ago indicated that Article 9 of the protocol, alongside Annexe 4, secures the continuation of Northern Ireland’s participation in the single electricity market on the island of Ireland. In that 2017 parliamentary report on Brexit and energy security, the parliamentary committee expressed its support for the preservation of the single electricity market, noting that it benefited Northern Ireland in energy security, decarbonisation and energy prices.

For those reasons, I make a special plea, as a resident in Northern Ireland, to support the amendments proposed by my noble friend Lord Hain. I urge the Government to accept them, because it is vitally important that there is a means to prevent unintentional and indirect negative consequences of excluding the jurisdiction of ECG on the functioning of the single electricity market. In that respect, I look forward to the Minister’s response.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, referred to a large section of the population not supporting the protocol. We took evidence this morning from Peter Sheridan, the chief executive of Co-operation Ireland—and I freely admit that I am a member of that board. It was excellent evidence that clearly highlighted the fact that yesterday he was talking to loyalists and, in their evidence, they did not highlight any particular issues about any return to violence. He had a very constructive meeting with them, from what he told us. So things are not as acrimonious or about to tip into violence as some would suggest.

I urge support for the amendments and, in so doing, support to underpin the single electricity market, which has been an excellent product since 2007.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I wonder whether we should stop and think for a moment. The electricity issue that has just been raised is the most serious—but not the only—disastrous situation that will occur if this Bill is passed in its present form. Since we appear to be having the opportunity for constructive discussions between the United Kingdom—or parts of it—and Ireland and the EU, rather than killing the Bill, which I would like to do, perhaps we might look pragmatically at what might be achieved. Perhaps the Government would seriously consider not proceeding with the Bill until they can see whether the current constructive discussions are bearing fruit. If they do not bear fruit, perhaps they could bring the Bill back in a considerably altered form.

I will add one small point to the splendid speech of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, about necessity or appropriateness. It may just be that the Government could think about whether they could not require “appropriateness” in every single clause. There must be some clauses where “necessity” would be the reason for changing. I understand why we do not have a Bill with a great deal of information, because it might cut across the negotiations that are being made—but, while they think about how they could improve the Bill, if they were prepared to pause it, they could look at this point about why much of what they are asking by way of regulation could not be by necessity and not appropriateness.