Senior ministers who have spoken out against assisted dying are giving voters a “false impression” about the government’s position, a leading proponent of changing the law has said.
Charlie Falconer, a Labour peer and former justice secretary, said opponents to the change were “getting more coverage” because ministers in favour of legalising assisted dying were “playing by the rules”.
MPs are preparing to vote on a bill to legalise assisted dying for terminally ill people in England and Wales later this week.
Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary, told a constituent she was “profoundly concerned” the bill would initiate a “slippery slope towards death on demand” and that “the state should never offer death as a service”.
Mahmood’s letter, which was published on social media over the weekend and reported by the Observer, warned the bill to legalise assisted dying in England and Wales lacked appropriate safeguards.
Mahmood, who is Britain’s most senior Muslim politician, wrote that while she believed in the sanctity of life and that was the starting point for her position, she was opposed to the bill for legal and political reasons.
Her intervention has triggered questions about how a change in the law would be implemented with the health secretary and the justice secretary opposed to it. Wes Streeting has argued it could lead to coercion and ordered his department to carry out a review of its potential costs.
Lord Falconer, an ally of Keir Starmer who served in his shadow cabinet until 2021, told the Guardian that the arguments from Mahmood and Streeting were giving the “false impression that their departments are against it”.
“The awfulness of them breaking the rules is that it gives the impression that their departments are against it when they most certainly are not,” he said.
Asked about the absence of a vocal proponent for the change within the government, Falconer said: “Nobody in the government can do it, because all the people in favour are playing by the rules. The rule-breakers are getting more coverage because they’re breaking the rules so spectacularly. And so they’re getting a platform.”
Falconer added that ministers’ religious views should not “determine the choices that people have in their death”. “Generally, the people who are opposed to it are opposed to it on spiritual grounds … There’s nothing wrong with religion – but that obviously colours their view and is not an objective stance on things like safeguards.”
Three former directors of public prosecutions have backed the bill, which Falconer said was evidence that it was an improvement on the current law. Starmer, himself a former director of public prosecutions, has declined to state his position but voted in favour of assisted dying in 2015.
“Keir is playing by the rules – rightly so,” Falconer said. “It would be incredibly interesting to hear his views as the ex-DPP, particularly to counter the views of Shabana.”
Downing Street sources said neither the prime minister nor Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, planned to set out their views before the vote on Friday.
Proponents of the bill, which was put forward by Kim Leadbeater, a Labour backbencher, say they are confident they have the numbers for it to pass its first parliamentary hurdle.
Opponents say a number of MPs are planning to vote in favour of the bill in the first instance without necessarily supporting it, on the assumption there will be meaningful scrutiny and chances to amend it in later stages.
Labour MPs who are not attached to either camp say that although proponents of the change have been better organised than its opponents, many MPs harbour reservations about it privately. The fact that MPs have a free vote and that Labour, the Tories and Liberal Democrats are all divided on the issue make the result difficult to predict.
Leadbeater told Sky News she welcomed “robust debate” and that she did not have “any doubts whatsoever” about the bill.
Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary who is in favour of the change, told the BBC that “it is really important as a society we talk about what makes for a good death”. The justice minister Heidi Alexander and health ministers Karin Smyth and Stephen Kinnock are also among those who support legalising assisted dying.
A source close to Streeting said: “Wes has approached this issue in a genuine, thoughtful and considerate way, setting out his own view while respecting others’ views. He has always played the ball, not the man.”
