Left to right – Wikimedia Commons: Official portrait of Kim Leadbeater MP crop 2, 2024, Official Portrait of Wes Streeting MP
MPs appear to be swinging away from supporting Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill, polling shows, though many who remain undecided could still vote in favour of it later this month.
A poll of MPs conducted in March and April by Whitestone Insight indicates that more MPs now oppose Leadbeater’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill than support it. 103 MPs were surveyed to provide a snapshot of voting intentions.
42 per cent were opposed, while 36 per cent supported the bill at the time the poll was taken, leaving a significant number of undecided MPs at 13 per cent, with 5 per cent intending to abstain from the upcoming vote and 8 per cent preferring not to say.
Last year, MP voted by 330 to 275 in favour of Leadbeater’s bill at the Second Reading, moving the draft legislation forward to the Committee Stage. A decisive second vote and debate at the Third Reading is set to take place on 16 May.
Many MPs who voted for Leadbeater’s bill last year said they might not support it at the Third Reading after the High Court judge safeguarding rule was scrapped in favour of a panel of so-called experts.
Labour MP Leadbeater had previously forwarded the rule as a vital measure to protect against potential coercion. However, many MPs reportedly felt that the rule was only included as a ruse to gain initial support for the bill.
In March, six Labour MPs penned a letter to parliamentarians that slammed the bill as “irredeemably flawed and not fit to become law”.
“Our efforts have not succeeded in improving the bill and we cannot recommend a vote in favour of it”, the letter continued. “It is our hope that the bill will not progress in its current form, and that a better way can be found to take forward the vital conversation about choice at the end of life.
“But a flawed and dangerous bill that places the most vulnerable people in society at unacceptable risk is no choice at all, and we urge MPs to vote against it.”
Health Secretary Wes Streeting has also said that he will vote against Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill because of concerns about coercion and funding “implications” for the NHS and palliative care.
SPUC is urging supporters and concern citizens to lobby their respective MPs to warn against the dangers posed by the assisted suicide bill.
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