Laws against assisted suicide provide equal protection under the law.

Jane Campbell

This letter was published in the Guardian on November 1, 2019.

The law as it stands does not discriminate against vulnerable individuals but affords them the same protection under the law as those who are healthy and able bodied, write Tanni Grey-Thompson, Jane Campbell, Liz Carr and Mik Scarlet

Tanni Grey-Thompson

Campaigners for assisted suicide – or assisted dying as they euphemistically refer to it – argue that “the only way to ensure the law is fit for purpose is to hear from those it affects most” (Letters, 31 October). The law as it stands does not only affect those relatives who have made the difficult decision to assist relatives with their journey to Dignitas but also those people in the UK who would be considered typical candidates for assisted suicide, including those who are seriously ill or disabled.

Actress Liz Csrr

The law as it stands does not discriminate against vulnerable individuals but affords them the same protection under the law as those who are healthy and able bodied. We sincerely hope that any inquiry into section 2 of the 1961 Suicide Act will be hearing from everyone who is affected by it, including those who believe it retains a vital principle concerning equality before the law and protecting their fundamental rights.

Tanni Grey-Thompson, Jane Campbell Crossbench, House of Lords, Liz Carr, Mik Scarlet

You Don’t Want to be a Burden, Do You?

This article was written and published by Nancy Valko on April 26, 2018.

Nancy Valko

By Nancy Valko

An April 13, 2018 USA Today op-ed titled “Make an End-of-life plan or Lose your Money and Choices in your Dying Days” by Hattie Bryant begins with the statement “End-of-life care can bankrupt your family and rob you of choices. End the denial about dying. Make a plan in case you end up seriously ill and frail.” (Emphasis added)

Ms. Bryant is very upfront about using the economic argument about aging and the enormous toll it can take financially and personally on the family as well as medical costs. She states that “in 2011, Medicare spent $554 billion and 28%, or about $170 billion, on patients’ last six months of life. After $170 billion is spent, those patients are still dead.”

Her solution is a new kind of economic advance directive she developed (and is selling as a book titled “I’ll Have It My Way: Taking Control of End-of-Life Decisions“ ) “that deals with how you want your funds spent when you are seriously ill or frail.” (All emphasis added)

Should We Have A “Duty To Die”?

Back in 1984, Governor Richard Lamm of Colorado found himself in the middle of a firestorm of outrage when, as the New York Times reported, “Governor Lamm Asserts Elderly, If Very Ill, Have a ‘Duty to Die”.

Here is an excerpt from the article:

“Elderly people who are terminally ill have a ''duty to die and get out of the way'' instead of trying to prolong their lives by artificial means, Gov. Richard D. Lamm of Colorado said Tuesday.

People who die without having life artificially extended are similar to ''leaves falling off a tree and forming humus for the other plants to grow up,'' the Governor told a meeting of the Colorado Health Lawyers Association at St. Joseph's Hospital.

''You've got a duty to die and get out of the way,'' said the 48-year-old Governor. ''Let the other society, our kids, build a reasonable life.''

This philosophy was echoed in 2014 by one of the architects of Obamacare, Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel, when he wrote “Why I Hope to Die at 75-An argument that society and families—and you—will be better off if nature takes its course swiftly and promptly” for The Atlantic Magazine.

At age 57 at the time, Dr. Emanuel states that while death is a loss, there “is a simple truth that many of us seem to resist: living too long is also a loss” that “renders many of us, if not disabled, then faltering and declining, a state that may not be worse than death but is nonetheless deprived. It robs us of our creativity and ability to contribute to work, society, the world. It transforms how people experience us, relate to us, and, most important, remember us. We are no longer remembered as vibrant and engaged but as feeble, ineffectual, even pathetic.” (Emphasis added)

He states that he will stop trying to prolong his own life by age 75.

Conclusion

Helping to care for many terminally ill or seriously disabled relatives, friends and patients of all ages for many decades both professionally and personally, I have a different perspective.

We are all born dependent on others for care and many of us need at least some help from others at the end of our lives. This can be hard at times-as even parents of newborns will attest-but the rewards are great both for the helper and the person being helped.

I remember when my mother with Alzheimer’s and terminal thyroid cancer was dying in 1988. It wasn’t the most convenient time for us, to say the least. I was a suddenly single parent with three young children and financially struggling. My mother no longer recognized me but, as I told a friend, the most important issue was that I recognized her. As a family, we did what was medically reasonable for my mother to help her without either prolonging or hastening her dying.

Taking care of my mother was a wonderful, if occasionally difficult, experience and I am grateful that we were able to keep her at home almost to the very end.

The final result was that my mother was kept safe, comfortable and loved. Her funeral was truly a celebration of her life and my children learned an important lesson about the circle of life and taking care of each other. We still talk fondly about their time helping with grandma, even after 30 years.

When I made out my own advance directive, I made sure that it was as protective as possible against a hastened death. I don’t fear death. I do fear the bio-ethicists and others who use economics and fear to push especially older people into prematurely signing away their rights to even basic care and what this does to our society.

I'm an atheist and against euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Kevin Yuill

Kevin Yuill, who wrote the book - Assisted Suicide: The Liberal Humanist Case Against Legalisation, wrote an article that was published today in the Australian Spectator titled: I'm an athiest and against euthanasia.

Yuill, who teaches American studies at the University of Sunderland, begins his article by challenging the euthanasia lobby claim that only religious people oppose euthanasia. Yuill writes:

Jeremy Irvine spent two years making a documentary entitled Fade to Black, which follows terminally ill Peter Short’s final months as he transforms from businessman into a right-to-die activist. Irvine, who claims the film canvasses the ‘full spectrum’ of views about whether Australia should allow assisted dying, came up with this bizarre claim: ‘Without exception those who opposed assisted dying laws did so because of their religious beliefs — even those who offered other reasons for their views.’ 

‘I spent probably 12 months searching and I found it really tough to find people who opposed assisted dying laws who weren’t looking at [sic] from a religious view.’ ‘Even people who would not talk about their religion, if you dug a little deeper, it would always come to that: “Oh, I’m a Catholic”. I didn’t find anybody.’ 

I feel like the kid at the front of the class with his hand up as the teacher scans everywhere else in the room for a hand. Me! Over here, Mr Irvine! In 2013, I published a book entitled Assisted Suicide: The Liberal, Humanist Case Against Legalisation. I have been writing about this subject for more than 20 years. OK, the book has sold modestly, shall we say, down under. But it is there if you look for it. And, I really am an atheist. 

Irvine might have asked his fellow supporter of assisted dying, Andrew Denton. Mr Denton knows my ideas, if not me. He has berated me on some of his podcasts (he added eerie music to selected parts of a speech I did in Adelaide in 2015, which he recorded with my permission, like a morbid DJ). I wrote to him in a friendly and respectable manner more than once to point out some inaccuracies and, more importantly, to open up a dialogue. 

He never replied. He’d had the chance to speak to me before. He sat through my conference speech in Adelaide, where I was billed as an atheist. Did he attempt to interview me (though he interviewed many of the others at the conference) or even introduce himself? No. 

I’m not the only atheist in the “No” camp. Prominent British actress and comedienne Liz Carr has recently returned from your fair country and, lo, she, too, is an atheist. So was the late great Stella Young. We exist!

Yuill continues his article by explaining why he opposes euthanasia:

Not Dead Yet UK intervenes in assisted suicide court case.

Alex Schadenberg
International Chair - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Disability rights group - Not Dead Yet UK is intervening at the UK High Court in the Conway case. The Conway case seeks to strike down Britain's law that protects people from assisted suicide in the UK.

In their press release, Not Dead Yet states that legalising assisted suicide by any means would put other disabled and terminally ill people at risk. The Not Dead Yet UK press release states:

Not Dead Yet UK maintains any imposed safeguards will never be watertight enough to successfully protect all ill and disabled people from a change to the Suicide Act. The Act currently provides much needed protection to disabled and terminally ill people by prohibiting anyone from assisting another person to kill themselves. Even if only one person dies against their wishes as a result of a change to the law that is one death too many and completely unacceptable. We argue that disabled and terminally ill people are just as entitled to this protection as everyone else; to single out one group of society as different to the rest is a dangerous move and will be open to misinterpretation. Legalising Assisted Suicide for disabled and terminally ill people would again set us aside from the rest of society. We would effectively be second class citizens again, with suicide seen as a valid choice for us while non-disabled people would be encouraged to live. 

This issue was last considered by Parliament almost two years ago (September 2015) when Rob Marris MP’s “Assisted Dying Bill” was decisively defeated by 330 to 118 votes in the House of Commons. Mr Conway is now attempting to override Parliament’s decision by seeking a change in the law through the Courts.

The Press release then quotes from a few of their notable leaders:

Baroness Jane Campbell

Disability campaigner Baroness Campbell of Surbiton, one of the founders of Not Dead Yet UK said, 

“We have successfully seen off attempts to change the law on Assisted Suicide in Parliament. Now we must change tactics to ensure the Courts continue to uphold our equal right to life. The law must not be weakened via the back door.” 

Speaking for Not Dead Yet UK, co-founder Phil Friend said, 

“A change in the law is a terrifying prospect to the vast majority of disabled and terminally ill people who work hard towards achieving equality for all. Until we have reached that objective Assisted Suicide will remain a dangerous and prejudiced option, likely to increase suffering and distress”. 

Liz Carr

Liz Carr, star of BBC1 drama ‘Silent Witness’ states, 

“Disabled and terminally ill people want support to live – not to die. It is important that the Court hears from the people most at risk from any change to the current law. As a long standing supporter of Not Dead Yet UK I am keen to take an active role in making that happen”.

Link to other articles concerning the disability rights group Not Dead Yet.

Assisted Suicide – Is It All About The Money?

The following article was published by Hope Australia on July 20, 2017.

Paul Russell

By Paul Russell - the Director of Hope Australia

CEO of St Vincent’s Hospital network, Toby Hall must have been wondering at all the fuss over a simple observation in a recent article in The Australian about his network stating its blanket refusal to cooperate with assisted suicide should Victoria pass the Andrews’ Government mooted legislation.

I have written previously about the Greens’ Party spokesperson, Colleen Hartland calling for the government to review St Vincent’s funding as a response. A veiled threat if ever there was one. Surely the mantras of tolerance and diversity are broad enough to include a health service that has a conscientious objection? Maybe not.

But the most scathing criticism of Hall’s comments came from journalist Andrew Denton; also on the pages of The Australian. Denton was responding to the following statement in the original article:

“St Vincent’s Health Australia chief executive Toby Hall said the Andrews government’s proposed “conservative” euthanasia model was flawed and vulnerable patients would be put at risk by the proposed legislative changes, which he described as a “cheap economic way out”. 

“He accused the government of taking the cheaper option to “give someone a drug and kill them” rather than providing sufficient palliative care for the majority of Victoria’s terminally ill.”

But rather than providing any concrete evidence to support his criticism of Hall’s comments, Denton simply asserts that, “It is both incorrect and highly insensitive to the reality of how Victorians are dying” and then moves on. That is, except for this curious claim:

But by palliative care’s own admission all the resources in the world aren’t going to help them deal with all pain and suffering. It is not medically possible. And until we find a cure for cancer, MND and other diseases, this is unlikely to change.

The first statement seems to be a paraphrase that is, at the very least, debatable – depending on what one might take to be the precise meaning of each of its phrases. The second is redundant – if there were no difficult diseases there would clearly be little if any difficulty in managing symptoms.

But there’s a bigger picture here that Hall was alluding to, made abundantly clear by the call this week by Palliative Care Victoria for an additional $65M in funding in the state to help meet the need and to fill the service delivery and educational gaps. This follows closely upon the New South Wales Government recently committing $100M towards regional and rural palliative care services in that state.

The reality is that, in spite of Australia’s Palliative Care Services being ranked second in the world behind Britain, there are still service gaps and funding shortfalls. In that context and for some, the supposed ‘choice’ of assisted suicide is, in reality, no choice at all.

This is also true when you consider that in a landmark study by the Grattan Institute a few years ago confirmed that something like 70% of Australians expressed a deep desire to die at home when only 14% of people were actually able to exercise that choice.

So if you live in rural or remote parts of Australia not only will you likely not be able to die at home, but the services you receive could be well below Australian standards or you may need to choose between dying in a regional hospital that may not be able to meet your needs or being transferred to a big city hospital with all of the attendant dislocation. Perhaps assisted suicide becomes a more pressing option when other legitimate choices are limited. Hardly fair is it?

In spite of the need for increased funding for palliative care and end of life care being recognised in the Victorian Auditor General in 2015, the End of Life Choices Inquiry in 2016 and by the Productivity Commission this year, there was no additional funding for such services in the recent Victorian State Budget.

Yet, according to Palliative Care Victoria:

"Currently 55% of Victorian palliative care services report that they are unable to meet the current demand for palliative care. At least 26% of Victorians who die are missing out on the benefits of palliative care, according to the international measures of population need for palliative care."

They further note that there has been no nett increase in palliative care funding from the government since 2014.

Does this sound like a government that has a handle on its agenda? Surely, if they were serious about ‘choice’ as a value in promoting assisted suicide they would have increased funding in the last budget a few months ago; even if only to make the point that they take end of life care seriously.

No doubt they will point to the mooted lead in period until their assisted suicide regime becomes active. But Palliative Care Victoria’s plaintive cry for support won’t fix the gaps overnight. As Liz Carr told Victorian Parliamentarians a few months ago – fix the first 48 recommendations of the Parliamentary Inquiry Report before you tackle number 49 (the suicide recommendation).

Without such funding the CEO of St Vincent’s assertion of assisted suicide may be seen by bean counters as a ‘cheap way out’ has a ring of authenticity.

In Canada, less than a year after the Quebec and Ottawa government's legalised forms of euthanasia and assisted suicide, a research paper entitled: Cost analysis of medical assistance in dying in Canada appeared in the Canadian Medical Journal (CMAJ). It found that "Medical assistance in dying could reduce annual health care spending across Canada by between $34.7 million and $138.8 million." The bean counters must have been in seventh heaven.

The authors summarized: "Our analyses suggest that the savings will almost certainly exceed the costs associated with offering medical assistance in dying to patients across the country, and that the inclusion of medical assistance in dying in the services covered by universal health care will not increase health care spending, but rather will release funds to be reinvested elsewhere." Adding lamely: "We are not suggesting medical assistance in dying as a measure to cut costs." Really?

Daniel Fleming took up the 'economic argument' on the pages of the ABC's Religion and Ethics website, citing the Canadian study:

"Soon after the legislation was introduced in Canada, the above mentioned study was undertaken which had the object of demonstrating the savings to Canadian tax-payers as a result of the legislation. At this point in time, such savings might be considered an ancillary purpose to the explicit purpose of providing PAS-E (Euthanasia and Physician Assisted Suicide). However, they reveal important facts: end-of-life care is expensive, and it is not impossible to imagine a government or healthcare organisation which needs to face this fact during a hard budget agreeing to focus more attention on the cheaper options of PAS-E than on other forms of end-of-life care, an approach which has already been suggested by one of the world's leading economists."

Even the famous Dutch euthanasia enthusiast, Dr. Boudewijn Chabot recently lamented the effect of financial considerations in relation to euthanasia for psychiatric reasons in his own country:

"Ever since budget cuts turned chronic psychiatry into a diagnosis-prescription business, good treatment has become scarce."

Fleming warned in conclusion:

"These are uncomfortable considerations, and they take the debate outside of its typical contours which consider the suffering of an individual and sometimes their family, and whether or not it is right for that person to end their own life with medical assistance. That debate still needs to be had. However we land there, it is crucial to remember that the debate takes place in an ideological context, and if or when the legislation is enacted it will be done in a way that takes it beyond the intent of those proposing it, and into the realm of the value set of capitalism. Any legislation or major social interventions has social consequences beyond its original purpose."

There’s always the money question just as there will always be people who are at risk under any form of legislation. There are winners and losers in all of these debates.

Even Premier Andrews, now the prime mover in the assisted suicide agenda, once noted the money question, as Fairfax media reporter, Farah Tomazin noted last December:

Andrews' resistance was not based on faith, he explained, but from his stint as health minister under the Brumby government. It was during that time the Labor MP saw firsthand the incessant demand for hospital beds in an overstretched system and became increasingly concerned that "these laws might see a rationing of precious health dollars".

Andrews may have changed his mind to support assisted suicide, but his observations about the health system and the temptation to cut and/or limit budgets remains.

Irwin promotes assisted suicide by promoting his suicide.

No assisted suicide.
No assisted elder abuse.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Michael Irwin (86), an assisted suicide lobby activist and retired physician in the UK decided to end his life in order to promote the legalization of assisted suicide in the UK. 

As sad as it is that Irwin is promoting assisted suicide through his own death, the reality is that the attitude and language that Irwin uses concerning his own life mirrors the attitude of the assisted suicide lobby towards the lives of others.

Irwin refers to himself as "existing beyond my sell-by date" and that he doesn't want his friends or family to remember him as "an increasingly decrepit person."

By using this terminology Irwin is degrading people who are elderly (beyond their sell-by date) or living with disabilities (increasingly decrepit).

Liz Carr

Liz Carr, a disability rights activist and actress in the UK, last year stated in an interview why she opposes assisted suicide and why she produced a musical on the topic. Carr states:

“Until we value ill, older and disabled people as equals; until there are no more hate crimes; until their deaths or murders are no longer portrayed or perceived as mercy killing, and until there’s real equality and validity for those groups of people, then maybe we can have that conversation.”

Carr later states in the interview:

“The problem with disability is social oppression, not disability. The solution to that is not to kill a person; it’s not to give them easy access to end their life. It’s to look at the reasons why that person wants to end their life. And are we doing everything we can? 

Irwin, who is a past-president of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies and has promoted old-age suicide since 2009, was "struck-off" the list of physicians in 2005 for breaking the code of ethics.

Irwin's personal campaign to legalize assisted suicide devalues the lives of people with disabilities and older people. Irwin is promoting his own death in a manner that devalues the lives of other people creating a new pressure to die.

Liz Carr: Address to Victorian Parliament on assisted suicide

This article was published by HOPE Australia on March 26, 2017.

British actress, comedian, broadcaster and disability activist, Liz Carr is in Melbourne with her show: Assisted Suicide: The Musical. This is an edited transcript of her address to Victorian Parliamentarians who will likely debate assisted suicide later this year.

Liz Carr - Disability activist, British actress and comedian

I don't come at this from a religious point of view. I'm not coming here to tell you what to do.

I'm telling you what I believe and how it worked in the UK, because in the UK, in 2015, the Rob Marris Assisted Dying Bill that was defeated in the House of Commons.

I'm stunned we defeated it. I'll be quite honest, because much like in Australia as a whole, because I know different states this is coming up as an issue, this comes up in the U.K. all the time as a subject.

It finally got to parliament. The first time in 16 years that there was a parliamentary vote on it, and it was a private member's bill and on a Friday afternoon. You know what Friday afternoons are like. We have 650 people in the House of Commons, MPs. 448 turned up, pretty unprecedented to be honest. That's how important. This is life and death. It really is. That's not just hyperbole.

The vote went 330 against legalising assisted suicide, to 118 who were for it. Almost three times! We didn't expect it to be that strong; the defeat of the bill. Ultimately what swung I think, and what was the concern is that nobody, nobody, wants another human being or themselves to have a bad death.

Whatever we think on this subject and wherever we meet on the subject, I'm assuming we all want a good death for everyone. We'd be ridiculous if we didn't want that. I want that too. I just don't believe that we should legalise and get states and medical involvement in that, or a more formalised medical involvement in that. That's the only difference, and I think what swung it, and where a lot of MPs were is that yes, in some respects we want this.

The autonomy aspect is massively compelling, but the risks and the sufficient strength and robustness of safeguards is so difficult. It's difficult to prove and they're difficult to establish. Are the benefits to the few outweighed by the risks to the many? They were viewed not to be. That's where we're at.

People are still trying to change the law. Just today there's the Noel Conway case in the U.K., where they're trying to introduce it by the back door via the courts. This will keep raging. It's important. It should.

I also got the Churchill Travelling Fellowship and worked then with BBC World Service and made a radio documentary, and I visited all the countries where assisted suicide was then legal. The only place I haven't been to is Canada. I've been there and I know what's going on now, but I made a documentary on that. A little bit like your Andrew Denton, where we're two of the few people who visited, and interestingly he thinks its fine. I don't think its fine, and we presumably saw some of the same things. There you go. Of course that's going to happen, but I come at it as a disabled person, and that's relevant here.

Let me tell you in a minute why many disabled people are opposed, and why we figure in this debate quite strongly, because I think it's important to know that not all opposition is religious.

Opposition to these bills is usually marginalised as being religious and that's very useful to do if you don't want to listen to it, but actually if we want to introduce a bill like this, we have to listen to all sides of course, and we have to not diminish their view.

Liz Carr being interviewed on Australian TV.

It's usually religion, but actually disability rights activists have quite a strong voice, and certainly have in the U.K. I'm also gonna talk about assisted suicide, not assisted dying. That's partly because I think we should call it what it is.

Now assisted dying, many people will come back at me and go, but this is just for people who are at the end of their life. Therefore it's about they're dying anyway, but what we've seen in other countries is that's not necessarily true. The trajectory is not about that they're actually dying. That that could be many, many months or years off, but also they are choosing to take their own life. It's still that act, so it should have the safeguards that you get when you do call it suicide, which are prevention strategies as well.

And what we do know is that when you change the language, and you start calling it assisted dying, and you don't use words like euthanasia and assisted suicide, then you increase public support. Assisted dying is far more popular than assisted suicide. It's equally a political choice, what we call it.

Why am I opposed? Well, I'm not opposed to suicide. I don't want people to feel that they have to end their life. I don't want them to be in that position. I believe in suicide prevention, but ultimately that's an act for an individual. Where it gets tricky for me is the issue of state involvement, and the issue of changing the criminal law, changing the law, and the issue of medical involvement, on a formal level.

At the moment the law acts as a deterrent. It does in the UK. And that's really useful that it's a deterrent.

What happens when we introduce a bill and looking at what the bill might look like? I know we don't know what it looks like yet, because it's not been created, but looking at the recommendation 49 and seeing what that might be. What it does is it allows, it indemnifies doctors, and it takes it a way away from being a crime and that can be a good thing, but it means that there's very little investigation.

It means that it then happens behind closed doors. It's very hard then to prove anything, because if a doctor, and this happens in Oregon, if a doctor has supported a person through this, and ticked the boxes, they also then facilitate the prescription process and they also evaluate that process to the Oregon Health Board. Therefore the person doing it, and assessing is also the person accountable for it.

Of course we're not gonna see if anything goes wrong. Of course we're not, and I'm not saying that there's Machiavellian doctors trying to kill people. I'm not. I'm just saying that it is very compelling that if somebody wants to die and they approach a doctor that maybe sometimes they'll do what they have to do. That happens now anyway.

We can all argue about that to what degree, and I know that's one of the arguments for legislation is well this happens anyway, why not? That actually happens less than we imagine that, and it's still very different than actively taking that role.

I have met with disabled people all over the world in this issue. Why does it involve us? Because it's very easy to shut up disabled people, and go this is not about you. This is about terminally ill people. In the public perception, in the media, and in medical terms there is such a fine line between disability and terminal illness, that we become one in the same.

There was a documentary on this week on ABC. There are regular documentaries on your TV channels and in the UK that show people asking for assisted suicide laws, and the right to die, and most of those people are not terminally ill, and that is often very confusing. We see people that look like us. We see people that can't do certain things, can't wipe their own bum or can't get dressed, or are worried about those things. Well they're often things around disability.

They're often around loss of autonomy; loss of dignity. There are things that I guess is why disabled people feel that they can contribute to that, because we have lots of experience in that. We've probably lived a life of that. It is in a way, in many ways, about us, and it will be, because we've heard stories from many disabled people about how complete strangers can tell you that they couldn't imagine what it would be like to be you, and surely you'd be better off dead.

I know that if I went to the doctor and said that I was having trouble, regardless of the fact of what I do for a living even, I think it would be easy to convince them that my life was not worth living. Far more than my non-disabled partner, and that's a big thing for me.

If there was a non-disabled person at a railway bridge about to jump, what do we do? Do we go up to them, and go: in the name of autonomy and self-determination, you do this. If this is your choice you do it. I don't think we do that usually. We usually stop them. We usually prevent them from doing it. We usually put in suicide prevention. We question why they're doing it. We question their mental health. We would see it as a tragedy if it occurred.

Now if that person was impaired, was disabled on that railway bridge, would we act the same? Now you might say yes we would, but my bet is a lot of people would not act the same. They would go: if that person wants to end their life I understand why, because if I was like that I'd feel the same, and of course, because it must be difficult. Then we start to call it about choice. Then it's different, and for me if you even see those two people as different and those two situations as different that suggests we do have an unconscious bias and discrimination.

Legislation is therefore unsafe already, because not everybody already starts out as having equal value under the law or in the medical profession or in public perception. I guess, and I remember Stella Young talking about this a lot, can we have death with dignity, until we have dignity in life?

That's one thought that was really crossed my mind when I've looked at the end of life review from Victoria, is that there are 49 recommendations. It feels to me you can't get to 49 until you've done 48. All 48. Then think about 49, but not before. Why put all the resources, and this effort and all this time, into 49. Recommendation 49, until you've done the others. Then I think I'd feel happier.

Maybe lots of us would feel happier, because people are not having good deaths now. People do not have choice in how they live, and the support that they might need in life. Ill and disabled and older people are not getting what they need now resource wise, health wise, pain wise, pain management, palliative care, housing, NDIS - that's in a mess.

Until those things are sorted, can we really trust that the reasons that people give for wanting to end their lives are the real reasons, or that really it is about pain and suffering, or is it because we're not doing what we should be doing to support those people in life. It's too easy to go: do you know what, if I couldn't do that A, B, and C, maybe I'd want to end my life. I can't imagine. I'm rubbish with pain. I wouldn't want that. It's too easy to therefore assume that that's why those people might want to die. Maybe they just need decent pain control and support, and we need to make sure first, all of that's dealt with. Absolutely.

There's 48 recommendations. Plough into them. Come back in 10 years.

Then let's look at it. When I said about the person on the bridge, I guess there's that sense for me that it does feel like a discrimination. Look; I almost feel that if you're gonna legislate, legislate for everyone, or legislate for no one. I'm a bit all or nothing, but actually why choose one group of people? Why is one type of suffering worse than another? What if you lose a child? I mean that must be the worst pain. It's the worst pain I can imagine is losing someone. Losing a child must be dreadful. Now that's suffering, but we don't support them to end their life. We give them what they need; but when somebody becomes ill or disabled we far more understand and then support them to end their lives.

Why are we choosing these groups of people? I understand why. Its okay, you don't need to tell me. The response on that is rhetorical; but we are selecting a group. Why? I just put that out to you. Why that group of people? I understand it too. In the UK, and I know Stella had a very similar experience, most people will tell you, a similar experience in the medical profession and it's why for me I don't want to give that group of people even more power and control over my life. That's it. I think when you rely on the state for your life and your existence, you probably don't want to give them more power over your death as well.

I'm not sure they can be trusted. I'm sorry. Not that I think somebody's gonna maliciously kill me, but I think if I was in the right frame of mind, and I cost loads to exist... Let's not take this out of the economic vacuum. Rationing and decisions around cost are being made already. Around who we treat, around whether somebody's too old. Do we bother with an operation? Somebody's too fat. You've gotta lose weight. Already we're thinking about resource allocations in terms of medical treatments.

Baroness Jane Campbell

What about when assisted suicide becomes a medical treatment? How does that fit into that? Baroness Jane Campbell - she's in the House of Lords. She's a disabled woman on a ventilator. A very successful disabled woman. She's tiny like me. She looks frail like I do. I know I wear the trappings of being ill as a child and as a disabled person. She ended up with a chest infection. We lose loads of our people over winter. It's horrible, as a disabled community, we lose loads of disabled people, and Jane was very ill with a chest infection, and she ended up in A and E, and her husband was there, and noted that on her note, she has a do not resuscitate order. She had of course not decided upon that. She did not want that, and her husband had to go and basically make sure there was 24 hour support for her. There was always somebody there who knew who she was, but then put photos around the bed of her getting her degree, of her joining the House of Lords, of their marriage.

Don't just see this figure, and make assumptions over this life. People are far more than they appear, but those doctors had assumed a level of value of that life, and that's happening already, and that of course is what drives many of us to be very fearful of being in that position. Now, we can say well there are safeguards, and I think safeguards are interesting in terms of a piece of legislation. They are fascinating because the fact that we know we need safeguards means we acknowledge there's risk. This is not a process that's without risk, and that risk comes in terms of can we be sure that person voluntarily wants this? That they're of sound mind, that they're consenting, and that they're not being coerced?

Now some of the difficulties here are that we're asking again, doctors to do that. That very same doctor that made the diagnosis and prognosis have to do all this other stuff as well - and how do they know? I'm not giving you answers about how to work that out, but these are the questions with these types of laws: How do we know someone's not being coerced?

Coercion is not about being dragged to your death. Coercion is worse than that usually. It's usually social coercion, and it looks in the form of you decide yourself, because life's so poor, but that's not always physical or mental. It can often be because you've not got the support you need or because you're with a family that you don't want to burden; and even if they say you're not a burden, the fact that you've got the kids to look after or you've got work and you've got life, you can feel that. How do we unpack all of that?

I went to all the countries, as I said, where assisted suicide and euthanasia are legal. Some of the highlights for me: I met fascinating people. I loved who I met, on both sides of this debate. It's tough. The people who were driven to pass these laws have seen some horrific things. They've seen people that they love, dying. We've probably, many of us have seen that I think. Legislation won't change that by the way. Legislation doesn't get rid of bad deaths, and assisted suicide isn't also necessarily a good death. They can be ugly. They're not always, but they can be. They can take hours.

I met someone whose husband has taken 21 hours to die. They were still happy with that actually, but it's not quick necessarily. In the Oregon model it's lauded. Where people get prescriptions. Its 100 capsules and they can make you sick and sometimes they don't work. This idea of it being a beautiful death or an easy or a quicker death; well it can be in some ways but it's not always the most pleasant, and that of course is it: death is always gonna be messy, whether we have assisted suicide laws or not.

In the Netherlands, we know, the Netherlands are ubiquitous for going too far with everything, aren't they, and everything's legal out there! The latest, when we were out there, we were given a pack of tablets. Me and my partner went to a conference of assisted suicide supporters and they gave us the last will pill. It was a little pack of mints, because their campaign is around completed life or being tired of life. That's now people who are over 70, who have basically gone: I've done all I want to do in life. That's it. They're not terminally ill. They've just had enough. That's where they're going.

People talk to me about the slippery slope. Firstly I don't go with that phrase. I don't agree with that phrase, because it suggests panic and fear and things that are out of control. It's much more controlled than that; the extension of these laws. It's much cleverer than that. It's done in the name of equality. If you introduce a law in this state for those with only terminal illness, tell you what will happen next is people with other conditions will want to be included in that definition. They will. That's already happening. The law hasn't even been enacted to its full extent in Canada yet, but already people with dementia or impending dementia are calling for that extension. Some disabled people are calling for it. You've excluded us.

Again, whether you want it, just be fair. It's like calling it assisted suicide. Be very clear what you're getting, and be very clear where it's going to go because it will. People laud Oregon. Oregon currently have an amendment before their courts to extend their law to people with dementia. It happens everywhere. This is not just about Europe where it's out of control. No. This is about in the states too. By a natural extension, an incremental creep, it will extend as I say. It's discriminatory for it not to. People will take you to court, if they can't use a law that you've brought in. They want it if it's a right. It's either a right for no one or a right for everyone. That's where it goes.

We probably know about Belgium. Belgium where just for being old, where children... There was the first death of a minor recently from euthanasia. Last November, there was somebody with alcoholism based on that extension that I've just mentioned.

Let's talk a tiny bit more about Oregon before I start to bring it together. I know that it's talked about here, particularly in the older community maybe that people are ending their life before they have to. People are killing themselves. Is that gonna change if you legalise assisted suicide? Not necessarily, because what's happened in the states where it's legal in the U.S., remember its only six states out of 50 where it's legal. (It's already been not voted for this year in four states.) We hear about the ones where it is, but there's many that have opposed it as well, and the majority have opposed it.

Again, it's not like it's happening everywhere in the U.S. But the states where it has, and particularly Oregon, there has been a massive increase in suicide since it was legalised. That could be around the state that it is; it's very particular, very peculiar state anyway. It's also not about pain. It's very rarely about pain, and I think that's useful to know.

In the tick box forms that you fill in in Oregon, the reasons that people give, the dominant reasons are about loss of autonomy, loss of dignity, loss of the ability to do day to day activities. Pain is the second to last reason. It's in the 30% as opposed to the 80% and 90% where the other figures sit. This is really about loss of autonomy and dignity. The safeguards: two doctors that have to analyse whether someone gives consent, whether that's voluntary. That's there's no duress. That there's no mental health issues. That they have prognosis, the diagnosis. It's a serious incurable condition.

There are questions over that, whether that's with or without treatment. You might have kidney failure and if you stop having dialysis that would make it an incurable condition. If you stop taking drugs for chronic heart failure, that would qualify. There's quite a fine line with lots of these and you're not gonna know that until you get the final bill to look at.

I guess one of the things is we don't need to make a choice necessarily between suffering and suicide. There is a lot that we can still do in terms of palliative care and hospice care and support for people, and often when people tell me about bad deaths and I've gone to the people I respect in those worlds and said well what can we do? Can we alleviate all pain? For most people yeah, but there will always be some people that we can't.

But do we change a law for those people, and remove protection for the others, and is it as straightforward as that? Is it about the benefits to the few? Is it about the risks of the many?

Laws should be about protecting the majority and safeguards are difficult: the acknowledgement that we need safeguards is an acknowledgement of risk in the first place. This is risky. I've always felt, always felt, I feel that's a compelling argument.

I know lots of people would disagree, but I feel that even the risk of getting it wrong in one case is too much. What strikes me as bizarre is that in terms of something like capital punishment we don't have that for that same reason and that's a much higher degree of accountability. We have an investigation, a court case, police involvement, and still there are miscarriages of justice. We want to check is that person of sound mind, not being coerced, whatever all of the safeguards we're gonna put in, and we have that happening with two doctors with limited time.

It's also okay to oppose assisted suicide, and I say that as someone that struggles to remember that when she's getting hated for it. Now I acknowledge to the other side that if you support assisted suicide, then you may be called, the murderers. None of us are in a happy place. This is rubbish and a difficult situation, because ultimately we all want the same thing. We want good deaths for everybody. It's just how we make that happen and how we think that should happen, but opposing is also okay. To have concerns is okay.

Many disabled people oppose. Many certainly in the states and what I hear from around the country too, many indigenous communities. In the states black and African American communities often oppose more than other communities as well. People who were dispossessed. People that have had a negative experience of the state involvement in their lives often are more reticent about these laws.

The people who usually want these laws usually look more like the lawmakers and the doctors implementing them, funnily enough. Obviously you have, and I know it's complicated within Victoria, but currently nationally, the AMA opposes assisted suicide, and in the U.K. we have the same situation. We have the BMA, the British Medical Association. Most of the medical colleges, oppose as well, and they're the people who would be implementing. That's happening in Canada, that doctors aren't sure about their involvement.

No doctor's going to be made to be involved, of course. There's a conscience clause and no one will be forced to do it, but I think we do have to talk to doctors. We do have to talk to all these communities who are concerned.

The AMA said, there needs to be much greater investment in quality end of life care, especially nationally; including palliative care services. It feels to me and why I oppose, is: is this the right time? Are we mature enough as a society? Do we treat our elders, our people who are ill, our disabled people, our communities, equally? Do we provide the right or sufficient health care? Or too much? Do we provide the resources for people to have a quality of life while they're alive and a quality of death? Are we doing that now?

To make assisted suicide into a medical issue changes everything. I watch TV and I see compelling arguments and compelling cases and people and individuals who want what's called 'the right to die'. But one person's right to die becomes another person's feeling that it's a duty to die, and I know, and you can say it to me, but nobody's gonna be dragged there. If you don't want it you don't have to have it. It's not as straightforward as that, because once it exists it exists, and as I say some of the worst coercion is choosing it yourself, because you feel you've got no option.

I made the show, I made Assisted Suicide: The Musical because I have done all of the serious political debates on this subject on TV in the UK. I hate the way that the debate is polarised in many respects and how we very rarely get the chance to properly discuss it in a grown up way, and we don't. TV wants you to have two opposing views and it to be great TV. That's what they want. That's what debate programmes want. In some respects of course that's how parliament works too unfortunately. The interesting bit - and where it's essential - is this middle area.

This isn't easy. It really isn't. It can't be rushed and it's very, very hard to get it right. I decided in the end that I could do all the news programmes in the world but actually the voices of those who oppose isn't often heard as loudly, I don't believe, or as often. There's very few documentaries of those who don't want assisted suicide. It's not as sexy. It's not as sexy calling for a better NDIS or hospice care. It's just not.

I mean we've got many documentaries in the UK of people traipsing off to Dignitas. Loads of them. We can't get enough of them in the UK. Can't get enough. It's the same story, and I'm not saying it's not an important one, but what we don't say is the other side, and that's a voice that needs to be heard obviously, so I made show, and the show despite the fact that really quite serious about the subject matter, is a comedy, but it's also really thought provoking. You'll hear some of the things I've said, but I also just wanted to open up this subject in a way that we're not often able to do and to think about it in a different way, and have more information and have more space, and laugh about it.

That might sound bizarre and counterintuitive but deaths, some of the funniest things that have ever happened to me have been around people who have been dying. In the Silent Witness show I do, I'm in forensics. I'm not in real life, obviously. The laugh, the humour in the darkness. We need to connect through that and music, as well, really helps with that and opens that up.

That's why I made a show I guess. I want to leave with a question in the words of Katherine McKinnon: There was a big, big debate down in Bristol in the U.K., around whether we should legalise assisted suicide, and I just liked her. Her words spoke to me anyway. She said: I'm not saying that palliative care is a panacea. There are always going to be people who want to die before their bodies do; but on balance the risks of harm of changing the law to me outweigh the risks of harm of leaving it where it is.

We mustn't be duped into believing the mantra that autonomy is king; that we can have whatever we want. This is a recipe for a dysfunctional society, but I will leave you with a question. What is worse, killing someone who does not want to be killed? Or not killing someone who does want to be killed? At the moment on balance, I think the former is worse. I think that's a useful question and that doesn't help your job, because you've got a really difficult job here, but it's a useful question. That's what I would like to leave you with.

You can view the video recording of the address by Liz and the address by local Victorian Disability Activist, Jax Brown HERE.

Mary Kills People Promotes Euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

The local radio station, that I listen to, is playing a commercial for Mary Kills People, a six part drama on Global Television in Canada.

People have contacted me wondering what to do about Mary Kills People. We are disgusted by media outlets who insist on promoting euthanasia and assisted suicide without having the honesty and professionalism to equally promote programs that offers an alternative point of view. 

I have personally not wasted my time watching Mary Kills People. I would first urge you to boycott the show. If you have watched the show email your assessment of Mary Kills People to: info@epcc.ca.

I urge all of our supporters to contact the CRTC and demand equal programming. 

Global needs to do a series on people with disabilities who live fulfilling lives, or people with a terminal illness who through effective symptom management and social supports live a fulfilling life until their death, or people who had a terminal illness who survived? We need real stories that provide hope, we need stories that promote caring not killing.

Programs that portray euthanasia as heroic, caring and maybe even daring, are promoting euthanasia. These programs don't show us the real life circumstances of a person who is lonely and afraid of suffering, and feel that they have no real alternative, these programs portray euthanasia as an act done by strong independent people. People we should emulate.

Social change is accomplished through drama that changes our ideas of what constitutes reality, what is a good death, what is murder and what is mercy.

I am also concerned about the contagion effect connected to programs that promote killing. 

This is not the first time Global has aired a program promoting euthanasia. In 2012 Global aired: Taking Mercy, a program that promoted eugenic euthanasia featuring: Robert Latimer, who killed his daughter with cerebral palsy, Annette Corriveau, who had two disabled adult children who she wanted euthanized and pro-euthanasia "ethicist" Arthur Schaefer. At that time, the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition and the Council of Canadians with Disabilities responded with strong opposition to portraying the lives of people with significant disabilities as - life unworthy of life.

Recently Liz Carr, a famous British actress who is also a leader of the disability rights group Not Dead Yet UK, produced a successful musical opposing assisted suicide called: Assisted Suicide: The Musical (Comments by Paul Russell). Carr, who is an incredible comedian, proves that opposing assisted suicide can also be entertaining.

You can respond to the propaganda by screening the Euthanasia Deception documentary in your community and by donating to the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition production costs for our next video that is now being produced under the working title - Fatal Flaws.

Liz Carr triumphs in Assisted Suicide: The Musical

This article was published by Paul Russell on the HOPE Australia website on December 12.

No, it's not a typo and April 1 is a long ways off! UK Actress, Comedian, Broadcaster, star of the BBC's Silent Witness program and disability activist, Liz Carr has combined her considerable talents to create a thought-provoking and rollicking musical about assisted suicide. This article first appeared in CNA Daily News under the title: In new musical, disability rights activist tackles assisted suicide.

London, England, Nov 27, 2016 / 03:48 pm (CNA)

British Actress and Disability Activist Liz Carr

Physician-assisted suicide has been a subject of controversy for several years, but Liz Carr is taking the issue somewhere it has never been before: the musical theatre.

Carr, a disabilities activist, comedian and actress, created a production entitled Assisted Suicide: the Musical, which has been staged at various English theatres this month. The musical is aimed at drawing critical attention to the downfalls of physician-assisted suicide, particularly its effect on marginalizing the disabled.

“I wanted to use musical theatre to look at this difficult subject with the lightness and the kind of heightened realism of musical theatre,” she said in a video interview with Unlimited, an initiative for disabled artists.

“This musical, in a way, is my playground for…my thoughts on this subject, I have never seen this portrayed in culture – and I want to see that,” Carr continued, calling the musical colorful and vibrant.

Physician-assisted suicide has not been legalized in Carr’s home country of England, but it has gained traction in other countries including the Netherlands and Canada.

The topic of assisted suicide has also made a splash in Hollywood, with the film Me Before You showing a young quadriplegic’s path to love and ultimately euthanasia.

In Carr’s mind, films such as these ignore both mental health issues as well as social barriers, which is why she wanted to create a piece for the performing arts that would faithfully narrate the reality of assisted suicide.

“I’ve never seen a piece of art of theatre which expresses opposition to legalizing assisted suicide from a disabled person’s perspective – so I decided to try to rectify that,” Carr wrote in an article for the Guardian.

For Carr, the topic of euthanasia should be contrasted with presenting another way of life, where individuals with disabilities are valued and appreciated – not expected to die. Carr wanted to circulate this narrative to promote thoughtful reflection on what physician-assisted suicide means for the terminally ill and in particular, for the disabled.

“Please, don’t wish death upon us because you feel pity for our condition,” she wrote.

Carr also suggested that physician-assisted suicide “has little to do with pain” and more to do with quality of life, which makes its legalization especially dangerous for those with disabilities.

“In fact, loss of dignity, loss of autonomy, loss of ability to do daily activities, and fear of being a burden – reasons which are essentially more about the realities of living with a disability in our society – are all more important than pain.”

Carr’s musical was a sold-out production, premiering on the first anniversary of Parliament’s defeat of physician-assisted suicide. According to Unlimited’s site, the musical was laced with provoking “notions of choice, dignity, compassion and quality of life through music, comedy, spectacle and shared humanity.”

Now, Carr hopes the production will encourage education and debate about the realities of euthanasia legislation.

Legalizing some forms of suicide, she said, “does not mean that when a fellow human being – disabled or abled – expresses the wish to die…that we should agree with them. The value of a life is not just in its physicality but in our relationships with those around us.”

Liz recently supported disability activists working against euthanasia in South Australia with this video contribution:

Disability rights activists say no to euthanasia bill.

This article was published on the HOPE Australia website on October 17, 2016.

Lives Worth Living and Not Dead Yet Australia have joined together to let the South Australian Parliament know that they strongly oppose the Voluntary Euthanasia Bill 2016 in its current and its proposed (amended) form.

Writing to the parliament this week, Lives Worth Living made some keen observations:

• We note that there have been significant amendments to the Bill which attempt to remove some issues but there are still considerable areas of concern to us.
• This is now to some extent a new Bill and this warrants consultation. Lack of consultation with the disability community on euthanasia is an ongoing concern.
• The Bill does not name the disabilities or conditions covered or exclude any disabilities, illnesses or chronic conditions instead focusing on how the condition is experienced and perceived.
• This Bill does not define a terminal medical condition and imagines that you can make a clear distinction between a person with a medical condition and a person “suffering from a disability”. Most disabilities shorten the lifespan and there is no clearly defined boundary between a shortened life span and a terminal illness.
• The attempt to excise disability in section 10 is welcome but is actually ineffectual and this is apparent in the way it is framed i.e, “a person is not an eligible person merely because the person is … suffering from a disability (however described).
• All people with disability have medical conditions that cause a disability, meaning that disability is in scope at the outset. The disability arising from a condition is caused by a lack of access to rights, access, treatments and disability. The Bill misunderstands this on a basic level.

LWL canvasses an alternative:

We would prefer that the South Australian Parliament addressed secondary comorbidity, barriers and lack of supports experienced by people with a disability rather than provide a mechanism for suicide because of them. Instead of safeguards, we need to be talking about preconditions. Like the precondition that half of us no longer live in poverty, have good access to medical treatment and palliative care, that we have the care and support to live a good life.

And suicide prevention rather than enabling:

LWL is concerned that the Bill creates a double standard in the treatment and interventions around ending one’s life based on disability. Euthanasia is assisted suicide and as we read it the Bill it fails to mandate suicide prevention and other counselling which may identify other issues in people’s lives which weigh in their decisions. Where counselling is addressed it is an option for the primary practitioner, not mandated. For any other group in the community – young people, LGBTIQ people, indigenous people – we do everything we can to avert suicide. Where are the suicide interventions for people with disability?

The letter goes on to outline some of the difficulties people with a disability encounter when engaging with the medical profession. Difficulties that create or exacerbate concerns about legalised euthanasia and assisted suicide.

We are not satisfied with decision making and safeguards by medical practitioner around euthanasia as outlined in Section 11.

• Many people with long term disabilities have endured a string of negative interactions with medical practitioners who underestimate the life chances, value and worth of people with disability; 

• This occurs for a reason. Disability advocates operate from a social model of disability which assumes that barriers in the community should be addressed, whereas the medical model assumes we are the problem. 

• Medical interventions are different from disability supports and in some cases people require advocacy against medical interventions or decisions. Doctors with the best of intentions are often unaware of disability supports, interventions and advocacy that make a person’s life liveable rather than just trying to cure a person’s underlying disease; and crucially 

• The Bill does not even mention disability supports or advocacy.

LWL closes by calling on the parliament to reject the bill:

LWL believes that the Bill as it stands raises serious risks for people with disability and we hope it is defeated in the Parliament of South Australia. We are also releasing this letter publicly to contribute to community debate.

The release of the LWL letter is timely, given that disability activists from across Australia will be fronting the media and providing a briefing for parliamentarians this week ahead of the debate on the 20th of October.

The event was bolstered by a video presentation from UK actress, disability activist, comedian and braodcaster, Liz Carr directed at all members of parliaments in Australia.

Liz Carr puts the disability argument clearly in her 8 minute video which has also been released to the Australian media (see video at the top of the page).

You can read the Lives Worth Living letter in full HERE.

Assisted Suicide: The Musical

Alex Schadenberg
International Chair, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Liz Carr in Assisted Suicide: The Musical.

Liz Carr, the incredibly funny British comedian, actress and disability activist, is now also the creator of the production - Assisted Suicide: The Musical, that is playing at the Scotiabank Centre in London England.

Ben Cowles, with Morning Star, a socialist daily newspaper, interviewed Carr on the musical production. Cowles provides context and history related to Liz Carr.

A common assumption among liberals is that only the deeply religious or wildly conservative would oppose such a thing. Not so. 

A prominent campaigner and defender of disabled people’s rights, Carr has worked tirelessly to highlight the struggles her community faces including against the brutal austerity measures the previous coalition government introduced and heedlessly continued by the Tories. 

While society debated the assisted dying Bill last year, Carr tells me she spoke at Marxism conferences, talked to both the Labour and Tory parties, and even, she somewhat embarrassingly admits, wrote to Cameron. “Do you know what that took for me to do that? I prostituted myself because I knew he watched Silent Witness.” She shudders at the memory. “I used myself.”

Carr comments on the timing of the musical, exactly one year after the defeat of the assisted suicide bill in Britain.

“Nobody could have planned that,” Carr says on the cosmic coincidence of the musical being held on the anniversary of the Bill’s defeat. “It feels right, but not in a gloating way. This isn’t a thing where there’s winners and losers.”

Carr shares how she became involved with opposing assisted suicide.

In 2006 she was working on the BBC’s Ouch Podcast, a satirical show which discussed disabled people “in a way that hadn’t been done before.” 

Whenever the BBC needed a spokesperson on disability issues during that time, Carr says the producers would often seek out the Ouch presenters. “When it came to talking about assisted suicide, I got asked to do a few things. So I went from generally being interested in this topic to being invited onto shows like Newsnight.”

The article continues by covering some principles Carr follows in opposing assisted suicide.

You might have noticed that Carr does not use the term assisted dying.  

“I call it assisted suicide because, whatever your reason for wanting to end your own life, it’s called suicide. That’s not judgemental, that’s just what it is. When you call it assisted dying, I think that’s a political move to make it sound more anodyne.” 

Her opposition to assisted suicide is not religious or spiritual or even moralistic. In fact, Carr clarifies, “I am not in principle against supporting people to end their life, but I am in reality. There’s the moral, what we think is a good idea, and then there’s pragmatism.” 

“It maddens me that at a time when the NHS — the beloved, the fallible, the overstretched NHS — is in crisis that we are considering giving them the power to assist some people, not everyone, to end their lives. 

“At the moment it’s a choice between lying on a stretcher in a corridor, being denied the drugs you need to extend your life because the government can’t afford them, or wanting to die at home. But you can’t have that because there’s not palliative care and hospice care isn’t on the whole supported by the state.”

Carr then challenges the concept that assisted suicide is about choice and autonomy:

“If this is about autonomy, then surely handing over the decision of whether a doctor will help you end your life to a government is to lose autonomy, and this is a government we don’t trust. 

“No-one has true autonomy anyway. It’s a laudable value to have as human beings, but it’s linked to wealth and privilege, and as long as we live in a world where people do not have choice over their lives, then don’t talk to me about having choice in death. 

“Until we value ill, older and disabled people as equals; until there are no more hate crimes; until their deaths or murders are no longer portrayed or perceived as mercy killing, and until there’s real equality and validity for those groups of people, then maybe we can have that conversation. But we are not mature enough as a society to let licensed doctors end some people’s lives.”

Not Dead Yet UK demonstration

Carr then comments why people with disabilities oppose assisted suicide:

“One thing stands out to me whenever I see documentaries or news stories on the topic is that they usually show the disabled or ill person looking incredibly vulnerable, usually semi-naked, having something done to them like being bathed, as if they want to show the indignity of that.” 

For Carr it seems as though the media wants able-bodied viewers to put themselves in the disabled person’s shoes and to think: “If I couldn’t wipe my bum, if I couldn’t pee on my own, I’d want to end my life. 

“And that’s the tragedy for me. The press and many of the public will say that assisted suicide is a brave thing to do. 

“And often they show someone in a hoist where you’re suspended and exposed. I think it’s perceived as probably the most dependency-creating and humiliating piece of equipment, far more than a wheelchair, because you’re probably naked and being hoisted either from the bed to the toilet or the shower, so there’s an inevitable intimacy. There’s nothing inevitable about needing a wheelchair or a hoist that means your dependent. It’s the perception we’ve put on it.”

Cowles asks Carr why she decided to produce a musical on assisted suicide:

“Music is used to tell us how to feel about something. So you would watch these documentaries and there would be the saddest music and it was somebody looking out at the world going by. 

“But there’s something about the clapping along at a musical — you see I love a musical; I love being told what to think, weirdly. 

“I struggle with regular theatre because it’s too confusing. But with musicals, I’m guided through and I like that because I know what to feel through the music more than listening to the words. 

“You can be clap, clap, clapping along to almost anything and you don’t realise what you’re clapping along to. I like that because, with assisted suicide, the majority of people are clapping along, thinking this is a great idea but they’re just going along with everybody else rather than thinking for themselves. 

“And then I got really excited about the idea of a chorus song of people on hoists, and then the musical was born.”

The article ends with Carr explaining who she hopes to influence with Assisted Suicide: 

The Musical.

As with anything political, there are people on both ends who feel very strongly about the legalisation of assisted suicide. But it’s the people in the middle, the “people who by default think assisted suicide is surely a good thing to have,” that Carr hopes the play will speak to. “It’s those people to whom I want to say, ‘This is more complicated and more nuanced than I think we’re presented with in the press.’” 

“The problem with disability is social oppression, not disability. The solution to that is not to kill a person; it’s not to give them easy access to end their life. It’s to look at the reasons why that person wants to end their life. And are we doing everything we can? 

“I don’t have all the answers, but I hope the show provokes thought and debate. And as a performer I hope we give them a really good show.” 

Assisted Suicide: The Musical will be shown at the Royal Festival Hall.

You should also read the Liz Carr interview that the Guardian published about - Assisted Suicide: The Musical titled: Legalising assisted dying is dangerous for disabled people. Not Compassionate.