Seven Assisted Dying Bill opponents table 587 amendments between them

Today, members of the House of Lords will debate the Terminally Ill Adults Bill for the first sitting of Committee Stage.

Baroness Finlay of Llandaff, Baroness Grey-Thompson, Lord Carlile of Berriew, Baroness Coffey, Lord Goodman of Wycombe, Lord Moylan, and Lord Sandhurst, all opponents of the Assisted Dying Bill, have together tabled 587 amendments to it. Humanists UK and My Death, My Decision say this clearly goes past just being scrutiny of the Bill and is an obvious attempt to undemocratically derail the Bill.

Amendment Analysis:

Seven of the most vocal opponents to the Bill have put forward 587 amendments between them:

Over 800 amendments have been put forward by opponents of the Bill, and fewer than 100 have been put forward by supporters of the Bill. Lord Falconer, the sponsor of the Bill, has put forward 35 amendments.

Deliberate delaying tactics

Opponents to the Bill will claim that a bill of this nature requires additional scrutiny. They may also claim that some amendments are probing, designed to encourage debate.

However, some amendments are increasingly nonsensical, wrecking, and clear efforts to undermine the Bill. Baroness Coffey has put forward an amendment that says that a person can only have an assisted death if they have not left the UK in the past twelve months. This would prevent anyone who had recently been on holiday from having an assisted death, and would also be unenforceable.

Lord Goodman of Wycombe has put forward several amendments to increase the number of assessment stages from two independent doctors and a panel to five doctors and a panel, the fifth being a geriatrician. This would be impossible to navigate for a terminally ill person with fewer than six months to live, and a significant minority of applicants for an assisted death would be under the age of 60 (15% of applicants in Victoria, Australia are).

Several other amendments have been repeatedly discussed and voted down by the House of Commons, such as amendments to introduce a ‘gag clause’ to stop doctors discussing assisted dying with patients. They were voted down at both the Committee and Report stages there.

Undermining the democratic process

Assisted dying has faced unprecedented scrutiny, more than any Private Members’ Bill in history.

The Health and Social Care Committee inquiry into assisted dying received 63,000 responses from the public, over 300 submissions of written evidence, two closed-door roundtable discussions and five oral evidence sessions. They reported in 2024.

Since then, the Commons Bill Committee received evidence from 50 witnesses, 444 pieces of written evidence, and spent over 100 hours scrutinising the Bill.

As the Hansard Society has pointed out, for a 51-page Bill, 942 amendments so far are an unusually large number of amendments.

‘Indeed, it is the largest number of amendments at Committee Stage in the Lords for any Bill this Session. Only three Bills have attracted similar numbers of amendments, and all three were much longer Bills – the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill (725 amendments over 137 pages), the Planning and Infrastructure Bill (652 amendments over 180 pages), and the Employment Rights Bill (646 amendments over 299 pages). Moreover, all three of those Bills have now completed their Committee Stages. Since amendments can still be tabled up to the final Committee sitting, it is possible that the number of amendments tabled for the assisted dying bill will even more significantly exceed those bills. Notably, each of the three bills also had significantly more than four days in Committee – 12, 8, and 11 days respectively.’

As the Assisted Dying Bill is a private members’ bill and not part of a government manifesto commitment, if it runs out of time, then it could fail entirely. This would be egregious, as most of the public supports a change in the law and the Commons has voted in favour with a clear majority.

Louise Shackleton, who was under police investigation for accompanying her husband to Dignitas, said:

‘I sat by my husband’s side as he made the most heartbreaking and dignified decision of his life. He was suffering, and the only mercy left was to travel to Switzerland to end that suffering. For loving him enough to go with him, I was treated like a criminal. The system failed him, and it failed me. No one should have to choose between compassion and the law. We need change, not more delays, not more political games, but real, humane change.’

‘To see hundreds of wrecking amendments being tabled, many by the same small group of peers who’ve always opposed this Bill, is gut-wrenching. This isn’t scrutiny, it’s sabotage. While they play politics, people like my husband are forced to suffer, or die alone in another country. How can that possibly be right? The public supports this Bill. The Commons supports this Bill. These tactics are an insult to the democratic process and to every family that has lived through this pain.’

Richy Thompson, Director of Public Affairs and Policy at Humanists UK, said:

‘This volume of amendments is not about improving the Bill, it’s about blocking it. Assisted dying has already faced more scrutiny than any other private member’s bill in recent history. What we’re seeing now is a deliberate attempt to derail a compassionate, popular reform that the public overwhelmingly supports.

‘We need an assisted dying law to give choice to those who are suffering unbearably at the end of life. No one should be forced to endure needless pain or travel abroad to die with dignity.’

Dave Sowry, Board Member of My Death, My Decision, said:

‘Looking at the ridiculous number of amendments, I can only conclude that this represents a concerted effort by a very small number of peers, who are all against the Bill as a matter of principle, to block its progress.

‘They ignore the perspective of those the Bill is designed for, people at the end of their lives. Its aim is to improve the quality of those last weeks, and having accompanied my wife to Dignitas for an assisted death, I know how precious those weeks are.

‘The process must be as simple as possible for the vast majority of straightforward cases, whilst being robust and safe for the remaining tiny minority of complex cases. This small group of Peers must not be allowed to undermine the will of Parliament and the hopes and wishes of the public.’