Members of the States Assembly in Jersey have backed drafting a law to establish assisted suicide on the island for terminally ill adults experiencing “unbearable suffering.”
Following a debate in the assembly on Wednesday, politicians voted to approve a Council of Ministers’ proposal on assisted suicide, requesting the minister for health and social services bring forward primary legislation on the measures.
Drafting a law in the Bailiwick of Jersey, a self-governing British Crown Dependency, could take 18 months, with a debate taking place by the end of 2025. If the States Assembly approves the draft law, an 18-month implementation period would begin before it comes into effect, which could be by summer 2027.
Politicians rejected an option to extend the law known as Route 2, which proposed assisted suicide for those with incurable physical conditions which are not terminal but are causing “unbearable suffering” and that “cannot be alleviated in a manner the person deems tolerable.”
Another measure to allow health care professionals the right to refuse participating in assisted suicide was approved.
Assisted Suicide Around the British Isles
Jersey is not the only territory in the British Isles to be considering assisted suicide.Members of the House of Keys (MHK) on the Isle of Man, another self-governing British Crown Dependency, is debating its Assisted Dying Bill. The terms so far agreed require an applicant to have lived on the island for at least five years and have a predicted life expectancy of one year or less.
Debating recommences on June 11 and if it is voted through, the bill could receive a third reading in the House of Keys—the lower house of the Tynwald, the parliament of the Isle of Man—in the summer before moving to the Upper House.
In Scotland, a lawmaker introduced an assisted suicide bill for the terminally ill. Liam McArthur, the member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) who proposed the bill, advised a minimum age to access assisted suicide to be 16, the age of legal capacity in Scotland—a point which Mr. McArthur anticipates will be scrutinised by the committee.
If Holyrood votes on the proposals later this year, it would be the third time MSPs have been asked to consider assisted suicide, after similar attempts to change the law were defeated.
A report by the Health and Social Care Committee in February warned that the UK government would have to consider what to do if the law is changed in part of the UK or in Jersey or the Isle of Man.
‘Pandora’s Box’
A non-binding Westminster Hall debate was held last month in Parliament. MPs from across the political spectrum spoke in favour of legalising medically-assisted suicide on grounds that it gives people with terminal conditions a dignified death and spares families from watching loved ones suffer.
However, critics warned that the legal constraints of who would be eligible for assisted suicide would not remain limited to those with terminal conditions, with MPs listing cases overseas where young people with PTSD and depression have accessed state-sponsored euthanasia.
Demonstrating outside the Westminster Hall debate, Dr. Mark Pickering, spokesman for Care Not Killing, described assisted suicide as “Pandora’s Box,” telling NTD that once you open it, “you can’t close it.”
