Vote on assisted dying Bill to be ‘defining moment’, Health Secretary says

The vote on whether to legalise assisted dying in Scotland will be a “defining moment” for decades to come, the country’s Health Secretary has said.

The final vote on Liam McArthur’s Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill will take place at Holyrood on Tuesday.

MSPs spent dozens of hours debating the Bill late into the night over several days last week including during a rare sitting on a Friday.

They accepted 175 amendments to the Bill, including one which brought down the amount of time within which a person would have to be “reasonably expected” to die to six months.

The Bill, if passed, would allow for terminally-ill Scots to seek help to end their life.

Scotland’s Health Secretary Neil Gray said he believes the bill is now “within legislative competence”.

He said he will set out his voting intention to the Scottish Parliament on Tuesday and described the vote on the legislation as a “defining moment” for Parliament and the country.

Mr Gray told BBC Radio Scotland’s Breakfast programme: “I’ve been neutral on the Bill representing the Government’s neutrality.

“It’s been, I think, a very good debate from both sides of the argument almost the entire way through.

“I think Liam has led the Bill with grace. I think opponents of the Bill have set out their case, often in a very compelling way, and MSPs now have a choice on a Bill that I believe is now within legislative competence to choose on the merits or otherwise of assisted dying.

“It is a significant moment for this Parliament. We are in unprecedented territory, and it will be a defining moment, I believe, of this parliamentary session, and could potentially be a defining moment in Scotland for decades to come.

“So, this is a significant moment that we’ll be voting on tomorrow night.”

Asked whether he will vote or abstain, Mr Gray said: “I’ll set out to Parliament my intention.

“I have been clear that I have been neutral in the Bill, I have not voted on the ethical issues.

“I did at stage three vote on issues to do with legislative competence and technical and legal, some deliverability issues through the discussions of the Bill, and I will set out to Parliament my voting intention and explanation as to why tomorrow night.”

Some changes to the Bill prompted backlash, with the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCS) and Royal Pharmaceutical Society saying they now oppose it.

While the RCS said it “remains neutral” on the principle of assisted dying, it added that the removal of a key section of the legislation had “drastically weakened essential safeguards” for psychiatrists and other medical staff.

With employment rights reserved to Westminster, there were fears that if Section 18 had remained in the Bill, it would have been outside Holyrood’s competence.

A deal has been agreed with the UK Government that should enable employment rights to be protected should MSPs pass the legislation when it comes to the final vote on Tuesday night.

Professor Sir Harry Burns, who served as Scotland’s Chief Medical Officer from 2005 until 2014, has also spoken out against the Bill.

Sir Harry, who is Professor of Global Public Health at the University of Strathclyde, said: ““Passing a law which allows people to be killed because they can’t be cured ignores the reality that we can still allow them to feel the contentment of being in control, rather than the torment of being abandoned.

“Engaging positively with them to manage their symptoms and suffering, gives them agency and dignity.

“We may have no medical cures for their physical illness, but we can and should give them a sense of control over their lives, not a pathway to death.”

Mr McArthur has described the legislation as “bulletproof”.

He said on Friday: “I am clear that we have crafted a Bill that provides compassionate choice for dying people alongside clarity and protections for the professionals who will support them to exercise that choice.

“MSPs need to look terminally ill Scots whose experiences prove beyond all doubt that a change in the law is desperately needed in the eye and pass this Bill.”