The MP behind the assisted dying bill has proposed replacing the need for High Court judge approval with an expert panel in a move she claims will strengthen the legislation, which is currently making its way through the House of Commons.
Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP behind the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, is expected to bring forward amendments for a so-called “judge plus” system, after hearing concerns during expert evidence sessions last month.
In an article for the Guardian newspaper, Leadbeater revealed she wanted to scrap the requirement for an assisted dying application to be approved by a high court judge, because of judiciary concerns the process would be too time-consuming and clog up the courts.
Under new proposals, an expert panel — with a legal chair — would vet the assisted dying applications already approved by two doctors. Leadbeater claims the change will make her bill “even more robust”.
But opponents of the proposed legislation have reacted angrily to the change, including Conservative frontbencher and member of the committee of MPs tasked with scrutinising the bill, Danny Kruger.
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Kruger wrote on X on Monday evening: “Approval by the High Court — the key safeguard used to sell the Assisted Suicide Bill to MPs — has been dropped.
“Instead we have a panel, NOT including a judge, of people committed to the process, sitting in private, without hearing arguments from the other side. A disgrace.”
Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Tuesday morning, Kruger argued that Leadbeater’s amendment meant that MPs, when they voted to back the bill by 330 votes to 275 at second reading, did so on a false premise.
He said: “I have to ask why, if this is the plan, why this isn’t the plan that was put to MPs when the whole House of Commons voted it through at second reading.
“At that point the point was made very strongly that the principal safeguard for the bill, the way people could have confidence that it was going to be safe for vulnerable people, was that there would be a high court judge approving the application.
“That’s now being removed. I don’t think it would have passed the House of Commons if this new system — which doesn’t involve a judge, it is involves a panel of people all of whom, presumably, are assisted to the principle of assisted dying, not an impartial figure like a judge would be.”
Conservative MP Matt Vickers, who serves as a shadow Home Office minister, told Sky News that there had been a “slippage” on safeguards in the bill.
He said: “You need to make sure that vulnerable people are not coerced, are not put under pressure, often, you know, in very difficult circumstances where they may not be well, where they’ve got all sorts of challenges”.
He continued: “When this bill came forward, they told us that one of those safeguards was a High Court judge. And already we’ve seen some slippage on that. There’s a real cause for concern for anybody who was on the fence, who was unsure about how to vote in this legislation.”
Vickers added: “This was meant to be foolproof. It needs to be foolproof because it needs to protect vulnerable elderly people.”
Labour MP and mother of the House Diane Abbott, another critic of assisted dying who opposed the bill at second reading, posted on X: “Safeguards on the Assisted Dying Bill are collapsing. Rushed, badly thought out legislation. Needs to be voted down.”
Liberal Democrat MP Tim Farron added: “Lots of MPs voted for the bill at 2nd reading in the expectation that there would be stronger safeguards added at committee stage… and yet we now see that even the weak safeguards that existed, are being dropped.”
Leadbeater also spoke to the Today programme on Tuesday morning to face questions about her bill’s changes. She insisted that replacing a High Court judge’s oversight of assisted dying applications with a panel of experts would not move the process behind closed doors.
Asked if the proposed new process for approving assisted dying could lead to it being done in private, the Labour MP said: “It wouldn’t be done in private, it would be taking into account patient confidentiality but there would be public proceedings.
“And actually, I think it’s really difficult to suggest that by having three experts involved in this extra layer of scrutiny that is somehow a change for the worse.”
She added: “There would be a very strict recruitment procedure for people to sit on these panels, and they would not be there in a personal capacity. They would be there in a professional capacity to do their job.”
Labour MP Jo White, who voted in favour of the original proposal, told Newsnight on Monday evening that the changes strengthen the bill and will enable a “fast and effective decision” rather than face delays in the “snarled up” court decision.
She said: “The proposal, I believe, means there’s experts in the field actually giving a much sounder choice and giving the judge a better case for making that judgment on whether that person has the right to take their life.”
Josh Self is Editor of Politics.co.uk, follow him on Bluesky here.
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