A right to die

YET ONE more symptom of the culture of death rears its ugly head. The spectre of euthanasia through the side door has been summoned up again in Parliament. Next Friday Lord Falconer’s Assisted Suicide Bill for the terminally ill will undergo its second reading, although Parliament has rejected similar proposals again and again. Advocates of the idea continuously attempt to manipulate public opinion – with the frequent connivance of the BBC – by focusing on hard cases and twisting the meaning of compassion. The Falconer Bill aims to establish the “right to suicide”. Allowing doctors – with paper-thin safeguards – to prescribe a lethal poison for a sick person, would establish the principle of a “right to die”. This would then be extended wider and wider. “Assisted suicide” would rapidly be followed by demands for full “voluntary” euthanasia. It has been stated by eminent doctors and pointed out that “every law contains the seed of its own extension”. That is undoubtedly true of the Falconer Bill. If the door can be forced even slightly ajar, that opening can later be widened further and further to permit full voluntary euthanasia, bringing in its train – as Holland and Belgium demonstrate – much involuntary euthanasia and its consequences.