Scottish families have vowed to keep fighting for an assisted dying law after MSPs voted 69 to 57 against a historic bill. The legislation, which received majority support in earlier votes, would have made Scotland the first nation in the UK to give terminally ill people the right to die. Campaigner Norma Rivers, from Ayr on the southwest coast of Scotland, is living with terminal blood cancer and was among those closely following Holyrood's decision late on Tuesday.
She said: “For people like me living with terminal illness, today’s result is incredibly difficult to hear. But knowing that Parliament came so close to changing the law gives me hope. I want to live for as long as possible, but I also want the reassurance that I will have dignity and choice at the end of my life. I hope and trust that MSPs will come back to this issue very soon.”
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Dame Esther Rantzen told the Express she was “very sad for the families in Scotland who will have to watch helplessly as their terminally ill loved ones beg to be helped to die because their lives have become unbearable”.
She added: “I am very sad for the politicians and campaigners in Scotland who have unsuccessfully fought for terminally ill adults to be given this crucial personal choice.
“But I am sure this valiant battle will continue until Scotland votes through the reform that so many countries around the world have already adopted.
“It is, I believe, a basic human right, the right to choose a pain-free good death at times when even the best palliative care fails.”
Veteran broadcaster Dame Esther, who has stage four lung cancer, added that she hoped terminally ill adults across the UK would be “given this vital choice” soon, so “they can leave their loved ones the most precious legacy of all, the memory of a good death at the end of a deeply valued life”.
Scotland’s assisted dying bill was introduced by Liam McArthur MSP. It aimed to permit assisted dying for terminally ill, mentally competent adults in Scotland.
Lord Charlie Falconer, the sponsor of MP Kim Leadbeater's similar bill in the House of Lords, insisted the result did not affect efforts to change the law in Westminster.
Ms Leadbeater’s bill — which is backed by the Express Give Us Our Last Rights campaign — is expected to fall at the end of this parliamentary session due to time constraints.
But supporters plan to bring it back and have called on Sir Keir Starmer to ensure the Commons has time to make a final decision in the next session.
Lord Falconer told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that “we are ready, and I think the time is right in England and Wales”.
He added: “Nobody could doubt this is an incredibly sensitive and difficult decision for people to make. Whenever it comes, it’s going to give rise to passions.
“Of course, what happened in Scotland will give some degree of comfort to those who oppose it, but I think it doesn’t affect what’s going on in England and Wales.”
Sarah Wootton, chief executive of campaign group Dignity in Dying, said the result in Scotland will be “painfully felt by the dying people who want this choice, and the overwhelming majority of Scots who support a change in the law”.
She added: “But make no mistake – this debate is not going away. MSPs came closer than ever before to giving dying people greater choice at the end of life.”
Ms Wootton said support among MSPs had tripled since the Scottish Parliament first voted on assisted dying in 2010.
She added: “We must remember that this movement has been driven by the courage of terminally ill people and their families, who have spoken so openly about the suffering caused by the current law.
“This debate will return to the Scottish Parliament. When it does, we are determined to achieve the safe, compassionate law that dying people want and need.”