Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Lord Freyberg Excerpts

Friday 19th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Freyberg (CB)]

My Lords, over the past two days of debate, we have heard sincere and often moving contributions from every side of the House. The arguments for and against assisted dying touch on the most profound questions of life, death, autonomy and compassion. I have also received a large number of letters and emails from the public, some urging reform and others expressing grave concern. What unites them is the strength of feeling and the urgency of this issue.

The case against change is serious. Many fear that legalising assisted dying would undermine the sanctity of life, send the wrong message to those who feel themselves a burden or erode the doctor-patient relationship. Some point to examples abroad where, over time, laws have been expanded, and ask whether we can ever be certain that similar pressures will not emerge here. Others remind us of the patchy provision of palliative care and argue that real choice does not exist until every dying person can be confident of the very best care at the end of life. These concerns deserve to be heard with respect.

Yet the arguments in favour are no less compelling. For all our advances in medicine, palliative care cannot always relieve suffering. Too many families have watched a loved one endure a prolonged and degrading death, or else travel abroad—often alone—to places such as Switzerland, because the law here forces them into exile. Those who cannot travel sometimes resort to desperate means. In these cases, the current law does not protect the vulnerable; it abandons them.

It is regrettable that no Government have yet established a royal commission to examine this question fully, despite clear and enduring need. For over 20 years, efforts to legislate have drawn on international evidence and proposed careful safeguards, but each has faltered, leaving the cost borne not by us in Parliament but by dying people and their families. That failure of political will should not prevent us addressing the issue now. But alongside reform, we must also act to strengthen existing provision. I therefore hope that the Government will do more to ensure that palliative care is properly and fairly funded, so that nobody feels forced into a choice by a lack of support.

In taking this step, we can draw on the experience of others. We are not without guidance: over 300 million people worldwide now live in jurisdictions where assisted dying is legal for the terminally ill. No country that has taken this cautious route has reversed its law, and the evidence shows that, far from undermining palliative care, such laws often strengthen it.

The Bill seeks to offer choice—not compulsion—under the tightest safeguards ever proposed: multiple medical assessments, an independent multidisciplinary panel and new coercion offences carrying life sentences. It has been scrutinised for hundreds of hours in the Commons, amended repeatedly, and now comes to us for further examination. I therefore welcome and support the initiative of the noble Baroness, Lady Berger, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, to establish a Select Committee, so that further evidence can be gathered and considered without delaying the Bill’s progress.

The question before us is not whether dying people should suffer—none of us wishes that—but whether we should give them the right, under strict conditions, to decide for themselves when suffering becomes unbearable. To deny them that choice is to impose our values at the most intimate moment of another’s life. To grant it shows compassion, respect and autonomy, and would protect the vulnerable through law rather than turning a blind eye. That is why, after weighing both sides, I support the Bill.