Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams is the latest in a series of key public figures who has commented on the current pro-euthanasia campaign aiming to legalise assisted suicide in the UK.
Giving his keynote address to the Church of England’s governing body, the General Synod, at the beginning of this week, the Archbishop said that granting the right to die would be a ‘moral mistake’ that damaged the rights of the most vulnerable in society.
‘The freedom of one person to utilise in full consciousness a legal provision for assisted suicide brings with it a risk to the freedom of others not to be manipulated or harassed or simply demoralised when in a weakened condition,’ he said.
‘Once the possibility is there, it will not only be utilised by the smallish number of high-profile hard cases but will also create an ethical framework in which the worthwhileness of some lives is undermined by the legal expression of what feels like public impatience with protracted dying and ‘unproductive’ lives.’
He went on to say that despite the ‘agonising cases’ that we recently saw on our TV screens, ‘the balance of liberties still comes out against a new legal framework’ and that the ‘initiating of a process whose sole or main purpose is to end life is again to cross a moral boundary, and to enter some very dangerous territory in practical terms’.
‘Most of us’, he continued, ‘would still hold that the current state of the law, with all its discretionary powers and nuances about degrees of culpability in extreme cases, serves us better than an opening of the door into provision for the legal ending of lives.’
(Click here to read the speech in full)
The comments of Archbishop come as the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Keir Starmer, prepares to issue his final clarification of the law on when people will be charged for helping someone end their life. A large number of politicians, doctors, lawyers, activists and members of the public have raised their concerns over the potential legalisation of assisted suicide through the backdoor.
The ‘clarification of the law’ by the DPP is seen by many as bearing the potential of creating a checklist of how to avoid prosecution for assisting in a suicide.
DPP’s draft guidelines published in September 2009 set out a provisional checklist of conditions when prosecutions would not be launched, such as if the victim was terminally ill or disabled, had a strong determination to die, or if the person helping them did not profit financially from the death. Following a public consultation, the final guidelines due in the next month are not expected to differ substantially.
(Click here to see the CCFON call to Action to stop relaxation of law on Assisted Suicide)