Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Baroness Noakes Excerpts

Friday 12th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Noakes (Con)]

My Lords, I support the Bill. Much has changed in the many years that your Lordships’ House has been debating assisted dying for the terminally ill, but public support for it has been constant. The British Social Attitudes survey has found around 80% in favour and 20% against consistently for the past 30 years. Your Lordships’ House should certainly not be a slavish follower of public opinion, but noble Lords should at least hesitate before saying that this House knows better than the pretty settled view of the vast majority of the public, especially now that the other place is aligned.

I support the Bill because it respects personal choice and autonomy. However good medical care may be, it is a fact that it does not always cope with the physical and mental suffering associated with terminal illness. Terminally ill people have choices at present beyond accepting the medical treatment on offer. They can choose to refuse medical treatment, they can choose to refuse hydration and nutrition, and they can also commit suicide, but these are rotten choices usually associated with an unpleasant death. This Bill gives another choice to people facing certain death: the possibility, or indeed the likelihood, of a peaceful death.

I completely accept that there are dangers for those who are unable to make rational choices or who are pressured to make choices that they do not want to make. That is why the Bill is so complicated. The Bill goes out of its way to try to ensure that choice is genuine. I am sure that we will debate in Committee whether further safeguards are needed, but I hope that noble Lords will accept that there will never be a way of eliminating all risks without in practice denying choice to those for whom the Bill is designed. That is why I think that, in many ways, the most important parts of the Bill are those relating to the commissioner and to monitoring and review of the Act. If problems emerge, they will be reported, and they can be acted on. That is an important safeguard in the Bill.

Lastly, while I respect the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, in this instance, it has gone a little bit too far. Secondary legislation and Henry VIII clauses are not the devil incarnate; they are often the most effective ways of getting the details right on a sustainable basis to deal with how things evolve over time. I hope that our approach to delegated powers and indeed to the whole of the Bill as it moves through the remaining stages will be pragmatic, and that we will not let the best become the enemy of the good.