An open letter to the Prime Minister, signed by 3,400 doctors and other medical staff, has warned that a proposed assisted suicide bill is “remarkably out of touch” at a time when the NHS is “broken”.

Thousands of medical professionals – 2,038 doctors, 905 nurses and 462 other healthcare staff – added their names to the letter addressed to Sir Keir Starmer.

The letter slammed Labour MP Kim Leadbeater’s proposed assisted suicide bill, to be voted on by MPs on 29 November, as “remarkably out of touch” at a time when end of life care in the UK is “woefully underfunded”.

Among the signatories were 23 hospice medical directors and 53 respected professors of medicine who said that they had a “legal duty of care for the safety and wellbeing of our patients”.

The letter states: “The NHS is broken, with health and social care in disarray. Palliative care is woefully underfunded and many lack access to specialist provision. The thought of assisted suicide being introduced and managed safely at such a time is remarkably out of touch with the gravity of the current mental health crisis and pressures on staff…

“Any change would threaten society’s ability to safeguard vulnerable patients from abuse; it would undermine the trust the public places in physicians; and it would send a clear message to our frail, elderly and disabled patients about the value that society places on them as people.”

MPs and hospices raise concerns

Health Secretary Wes Streeting says that he will vote against the Leadbeater Bill because of the current poor state of palliative care in the UK.

“I do not think that palliative care, end-of-life care in this country is in a condition yet where we are giving people the freedom to choose, without being coerced by the lack of support available”, Mr Streeting said.

This week, former NHS psychiatrist Dr Ben Spencer, now a Conservative MP, also said he worries that legalising assisted suicide will divert much-needed resources away from palliative care.

“Are you going to prioritise people who want to end their lives over people who want their chemotherapy? So far I haven’t seen a bill that I think would work”, said Dr Spencer.

Dr Gordon Macdonald, chief executive of Care Not Killing, which is against assisted suicide, also warned that “this Bill is being rushed with indecent haste and ignores the deep-seated problems in the UK’s broken and patchy palliative care system, the crisis in social care and data from around the world that shows changing the law would put pressure on vulnerable people to end their lives”.

He continued: “The problems in end-of-life care, which have been chronicled in great detail in numerous academic and official reports, have been explicitly recognised by our new Health Secretary and many other parliamentarians, who want to fix the system, not change the law. We agree with them.”

“Woefully underfunded”

UK palliative care receives just 37% of its funding from the UK government. One hospice, St Joseph’s in London, must raise half of its total running costs itself.

Jane Naismith, the interim chief executive of St Joseph’s, which provides end of life care, said: “The state should be providing more funding for palliative care, no question. If maternity care was funded by charity shops and bake sales, what would people think? I struggle to see the difference.”

St Joseph’s states online that: “As a Catholic hospice, our position is that assisted dying plays no part in our specialist palliative care practice and is not consistent with our ethos or values. We neither hasten death nor postpone it. We cherish life, but also embrace a natural death when it comes.”

A recent Marie Curie study carried out by researchers from Cambridge and King’s College London found that nearly half (49%) of bereaved respondents were unhappy with the end-of-life care that a family member received, and one in eight made an official complaint, pointing to a “crisis” in palliative care.

“A disaster waiting to happen”

Daniel Frampton, SPUC’s Editorial Officer, said: “Assisted suicide laws are inherently dangerous and threaten patients who have already been let down by a neglectful health service. This is not the fault of dedicated doctors and nurses but the result of chronically underfunded end of life care.

“MPs must listen to the thousands of medical professionals who care every day for terminally ill patients. Rather than killing citizens, the state should be doing all it can to care for them. Palliative care must be provided with the resources that it desperately needs.

“Assisted suicide paired with a broken NHS is ultimately a disaster waiting to happen. MPs must reject the Leadbeater Bill for the sake and safety of all citizens.”

TAKE ACTION: Lobby your MP NOW

SPUC encourages supporters and all people opposed to assisted suicide to lobby their MP now, asking them to oppose Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill.

Over half of MPs are new to Parliament and have not voted on this issue before. Many have not even thought about it, and they will be getting barrages of messages from the other side – we must make sure our voice is heard.

A tool is available on our website to help you do this. Enter your postcode to find out who your MP is, write your message, and press send.

SPUC is not providing a template text at this stage, as politicians appreciate genuine, heartfelt messages over copied-and-pasted content. MPs soon recognise if they are receiving identical communications copied and pasted from templates or campaign websites.

For a terrifying insight into the threat that assisted suicide poses to people with disability, watch Liz Carr’s documentary Better Off Dead? – available to watch on the BBC’s iPlayer.

SPUC has also compiled stories of ordinary people opposed to assisted suicide, which you can access here for free online.