Why are MP’s debating whether legalisation of assisted dying in the UK?
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00:00On April 29th, MPs at Westminster held a three-hour long debate on the legalization of assisted
00:05dying in England. This debate was prompted by a petition started by Childline founder
00:10and TV presenter Dame Esther Ranson, who started an online petition for the legalization of
00:15assisted dying, which has since gained over 200,000 signatures. Dame Esther was diagnosed
00:21with terminal lung cancer and, back in 2023, she revealed she joined Dignitas, the assisted
00:27dying clinic in Switzerland. During the debate at Westminster, which came to no binding vote,
00:32MPs shared their own experiences. Conservative MP Siobhan Bailey began to cry as she shared
00:37the testimony of a man who had written to her about his mother's death. Yet Conservative
00:42former minister Sir Desmond Swain argued that a law change could lead people to being killed
00:47for simply being classed as old and likened the situation to 1970s sci-fi film Logan's
00:52Run. So with this in mind, what do you think? Do you think it's fair to give people the
00:56choice of assisted dying or is the law too complex to make a fair pass of? Let's take
01:01a look at what the people in our region thought.