Australian right-to-die activist Dr Philip Nitschke was given permission by the Home Office to enter the UK to hold a workshop in London on how to commit suicide using his ‘suicide kit’.
Nitschke, 61, dubbed ‘Doctor Death’, who was detained in France as he prepared to travel to the UK but released a short time later, spoke yesterday at Dragon Hall in central London. About 100 people turned up to hear him speaking.
‘It's a highly moral process that gives a person access to the information that allows them to have choice,’ he said.
However, his workshops and ideas raised serious concerns among politicians and the general public.
Baroness Finlay said people did not need to kill themselves to ‘die well’.
‘The vast majority of deaths in this country are now much, much more peaceful, much better than they used to be because of all of the advances that we’ve made within the medical care of people that are dying,’ she said.
Dominica Roberts, chairman of the ProLife Alliance, said:
‘Actually showing people how to die... this is against public policy in this country.
‘I do think that perhaps he’s not a desirable person to be allowed to come here frightening our disabled and elderly people.’
Care Not Killing, an alliance of individuals and organisations which brings together disability and human rights organisations, healthcare and palliative care groups, also wrote an official letter to Sir Paul Stephenson, Commissioner for the Metropolitan Police, asking him to send officers to Nitschke’s events in London to ensure that the law is not broken as his workshops will ‘involve possible breaches of the Suicide Act 1961’.
‘His workshop is clearly directed at the obtaining, supply and use of medications by which to commit suicide. This is no different from internet web promotions of suicide, which have resulted in the tragic cases of Nadia Kajouji, Mark Drybrough and others.’
‘It is an offence to encourage and assist suicide. An offence is also committed where a ‘suspect’ commits an act capable of encouraging or assisting the suicide or the attempted suicide of another person and the ‘suspect's act was intended to encourage or assist suicide or an attempt to commit suicide,’ the letter said.
Speaking during Nitschke’s previous visit to the UK, Dr Peter Saunders, Chairman of the alliance, branded him ‘a publicity-seeking extremist’ and said:
‘We’d like to see these talks stopped. He is effectively offering a loaded gun to people who need support.’
However, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Police said it had not investigated Nitschke and had not received any complaints about him, the BBC reported.
The Christian Legal Centre wrote an official letter to Home Secretary Alan Johnson stating that ‘Dr Nitschke’s proposed visit is clearly directed at encouraging or assisting suicide with the intent that another person will commit or attempt to commit suicide by use of medications in breach of section 2 (and 2A) of the Suicide Act 1961.’
The Centre says that Dr Nitschke intends to flagrantly flout the criminal law and that his presence in the UK threatens a fundamental interest, namely the maintenance of the ‘rule of law’ and the maintenance of a law abiding community.
‘Former Home Secretary Jacqui Smith noted that permission to come to the United Kingdom is a privilege that will not be granted to those who abuse our values and standards and undermine our way of life. She has excluded a number of individuals including mainstream US talk show host Mt Michael Savage.
‘Dr Nitschke’s presence in the United Kingdom is clearly more serious because he seeks to breach the criminal law. The Home Secretary is bound by the Administrative principles of consistency. We would therefore expect that given the circumstances, an Exclusion Order will be issued to Dr Nitschke before he enters the United Kingdom,’ the letter said.
However, Nitschke was interviewed by the Home Office on arrival in the UK and given permission to stay.
Nitschke has gained notoriety through his advocacy of the ‘CoGen’ machine (to generate carbon monoxide gas), the ‘exit bag’ (to place over people’s heads) and ‘the peaceful pill handbook’ which was prohibited by both the Australian and New Zealand Offices for Film and Literature Classification because it instructs on drug manufacture and other crimes.
It was reported in ‘The Age’ (National Australian newspaper) on 18 February 2010 that coroners were aware of 51 Australians who had died from an overdose of Nembutal, a lethal barbiturate that Nitschke has promoted since the late 1990’s as ‘a peaceful way to die’. Of the 38 cases fully investigated by coroners, only 11 people were known to have suffered chronic physical pain or a terminal illness before their deaths prompting some to speculate that the remaining 27 people had taken their lives for psychological reasons. Of the 51, 14 were Australians aged in their 20’s and 30’s.