There has been a slew of pieces suggesting that the assisted dying bill is in big trouble and may face defeat when it returns to the Commons, all because of Kim Leadbeater’s plan to drop the sign-off by a High Court judge. The Sun says “the last-minute tweak, proposed just hours before MPs began debating the bill on Tuesday, has sparked a backlash—throwing its future into doubt and turning former supporters cold”. But the article fails to quote even a single former supporter feeling chilly.
As we reported here last week, the Independent started this particular ball rolling—and it has been picking up speed ever since, with those opposed to the bill gleefully pushing hard the notion that it will make a clean strike of the whole thing. Right To Life use the Indy’s report to declare the bill is now in “jeopardy after major safeguard scrapped”.
The Indy did at least do some proper journalism—it did find and name one MP who declared he was likely to switch his vote to “no”. But the contention that 60 other MPs may do the same has prompted a couple of pro-bill charities to push back. My Death My Decision (MDMD) and Humanists UK put out a joint statement: “Such notions are overblown. The 60 includes many who MDMD and Humanists UK know from conversations are not changing their minds as a result of this amendment. Indeed many are quoted above. While it may be in opponents’ interests to try to whip up the notion that very large numbers of MPs could change their mind, there is no reason based on this list to think that this will happen.”
That rather cautious assessment isn’t decisive, and I’d be interested to hear the views of lobby correspondents who are well placed to judge the real mood. But I can hazard some thoughts about what's actually been going on over the last few days.
For a start, blame journalists—journalists like me. Frankly, we find it more interesting to ask whether the bill is in trouble, even on scant evidence, even if the answer is pretty straightforwardly: “not really, no”. But even asking the question creates momentum because the bill’s many strong opponents will, of course, seize upon anything that gives them hope and encouragement.
I tend to agree with Polly Toynbee, writing in the Guardian: “Only in the pages of the Tory press are MPs stampeding: actual MPs seem to be moving little.” The debate has become more ideological, with the right-wing press furiously against it. It’s not quite so easy to see why this is when the debate in the Commons was so free of party politics. But I presume it’s a sort of High Tory, High Church thing—plus any stick with which to beat Labour.
But it’s more than that. Because it’s such a controversial bill it would have always faced intense scrutiny and press interest. But the fact that it is a private members’ bill and was a free vote has made a critical difference.
The Financial Times, quoting Jill Rutter from the Institute for Government, is clearly right to suggest the whole process would have been cleaner and better had the government adopted the bill. It also doesn’t take a huge amount of political nous to see why Keir Starmer wouldn’t want to touch it with a 16-foot, well-disinfected barge pole. That would be true even if he was basking in the sunny uplands of electoral approval in a calm and tranquil world. So dream on.
But the fact that it is both a private members’ bill and a matter of conscience—a free vote—is what the coverage and the jeopardy now turn on. Kim Leadbeater does not have the power of the whips behind her. She does not have a government majority to rely on. The vast majority of nail-biting, knife-edge votes star only a handful of heroes, conscience-stricken malcontents balancing on the blade, willing to defy party and the whips.
That would be a luxury for Leadbeater, who faces a phalanx of MPs eager to see themselves as heroic figures in an epic struggle to create a bomb-proof bill. While she has some very firm supporters, she has to battle with the conscience and deliberation of every single MP who voted for the bill every time she opens her mouth. And every single MP will want to make it clear to their conflicted constituents just how carefully, how seriously, they are taking this most serious of serious matters. You can hear the sound of deliberative chin-stroking from here.
That does make the going tough. I feel it has made Leadbeater, if not panic, react instinctively and too fast for some, who regard it as “rushed, slapdash, on-the-hoof legislation”. I’ve been predicting a move to a panel for some time—and think it is sensible. But was it wise to make the announcement at 10pm, the night before the committee met? No doubt it felt smart, a way of feeding the beast (the press) rather than allowing it to feed off you. With the blessed gift of hindsight, not so much.
But Leadbeater might have expected a warmer reception. After all, virtually no one backed the High Court judge plan. Certainly not the MP who told the Commons during the big debate: “Many eminent judges have made the point that it will overwhelm the family courts if the test were applied properly, but it will not be applied properly, because the bill assumes that judges will fulfil a new inquisitorial role and actually look into cases as investigators, which is entirely unknown in English common law. But the bill will not require any actual investigation.
“There is no requirement for a judge even to meet the applicant. They simply have to have a phone call, or maybe it will be an email, from one of the medics. That is it.”
Surely, Leadbeater might have hoped that this MP, perhaps the strongest critic of the bill, might welcome the scrapping of this poor, scorned plan, or at least have greeted it in silence. Not a bit of it. Danny Kruger was on the radio within hours branding it “a disgrace”.
That indeed is what it is, in a nutshell: the fluidity of principled opposition to cloak their principle in any old jumble of pragmatic clothing that is near to hand.
And every change opens up an opportunity for a new assault on the detail. The Spectator’s Steerpike claims the bill “seems to be dying a slow death itself. The legislation is losing support” because the new plan would mean a “death tsar” being appointed—which is weirdly reminiscent of Sarah Palin’s death panels. Can you, I wonder, see Russia from the walls of Gormenghast?
The Daily Mail, no slouch at making its readers shiver with fear with a phrase from the lexicon of the hard right, picks up the transfiguration of a former High Court judge into a chilling Death Tsar, a cross between K’s tormenters, Darth Vadar and Judge Dread. These people know their business.
No, I don’t think the bill is on the brink of defeat, but its opponents have influential friends who know how to create a powerful storm. They can ensure it will sail in troubled waters until the final vote is done.
