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02. Email Builder - WM MPs - Leadbeater Bill

Stephen Kinnock, MP

Aberafan Maesteg

If you have time, we recommend personalising this letter, because this always makes it stand out more to your MP. You can edit the subject heading and the text of the message. If you prefer, feel free to send it as it is.

PLEASE NOTE: Your MP, Sir Julian Lewis, does not receive email correspondence. Why not copy and paste the email into a letter and post it to him at Sir Julian Lewis MP, House of Commons, London, SW1A 0AA

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EMAIL MESSAGE

Dear Mr Kinnock,
I write to express my grave concerns regarding the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, scheduled for its Second Reading on 29th November.
 
A healthy society’s mission should be to assist vulnerable, disabled, and terminally ill people on how to live their lives, rather than how to die. Most of the argument in favour of legalising assisted suicide is about choice, but the pressures that vulnerable people will be under to ease their family’s or friend’s burden will limit the freedom of their choice.
 
As the Health Secretary has said there is significant concern “about the risk of people being coerced into taking their own lives sooner than they would have liked, or feeling…guilt-tripped, feeling like a burden,” if we legalise assisted suicide.<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1">[1]</a>
 
This is not a party-political issue either, Ed Davey is worried about “the impact on the psychology… …of elderly people and some disabled people.”<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2">[2]</a>  Leading disability rights campaigners – Baroness Grey-Thompson and Liz Carr – echo these concerns.
 
This doesn’t just affect healthcare. Legal professionals have expressed concerns over the viability of safeguards requiring judicial oversight.
 
The judges in the family court – where decisions would be decided – are under huge pressure. There are only 20 full-time judges in the Family Division.<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3">[3]</a> There could be thousands of applications for assisted suicide every year and each case will require significant legal time to be considered. As Sir James Mumby, former president of the Family Division has asked: “Is this a proper function for the judges? Is this truly a judicial function at all?”<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4">[4]</a> Where is this money going to come from? Who is going to pay for it?
 
Additionally, I am concerned by the lack of clarity on whether judges, like medical professionals, could conscientiously object to participating in cases with life-or-death stakes. Such a critical issue affecting vulnerable people demands legislative precision and robust safeguards – elements sorely lacking here.
 
Our amazing social and palliative care system is under too much strain already. How can we expect it to cope with the enormous pressure that implementing this law would add, especially if we want there to be proper safeguards around this system? We urgently need a proper conversation on social and palliative care in this country, but this PMB is not the way to do it.
 
This issue is too important to rush through now without considering all the consequences. 
 
Voting no to the Assisted Suicide PMB on 29 November should be the start, not the end, of the conversation on end of life in this country.
 
As my MP, please attend the debate and please vote against the Bill, not the conversation.
 
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<a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1">[1]</a> BBC News, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx276lwn6n2o">link</a>
<a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2">[2]</a> The Telegraph, <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/31/ed-davey-very-minded-to-vote-against-assisted-dying-bill/">link</a>
<a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3">[3]</a> Landmark Chambers, <a href="https://www.landmarkchambers.co.uk/news-and-cases/physician-assisted-dying-a-guide-to-some-of-the-legal-issues-arising-in-the-forthcoming-debates">link</a>
<a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4">[4]</a> The Telegraph, <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/01/doubts-raised-judges-assisted-dying-court-cases/">link</a>
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