Good afternoon friend,

Today, the Health and Social Care Select Committee has demonstrated that MPs have listened to us, by launching the first ever House of Commons inquiry into assisted dying. This follows three years of intense work on our #CompassionIsNotACrime campaign, led by families with direct experience of the failure of the current law. 

I am so grateful to you and all our incredible supporters who refused to let this issue drop. This is a historic milestone - parliamentary inquiries have often been the first step toward law change around the world. I urge the committee to make the most of this opportunity to put dying people and their families - their needs and experiences - at the heart of this inquiry. 

Joy Munns has been at the forefront of this campaign since 2019. Joy's mother, Mavis Eccleston, was tried and acquitted of murder and manslaughter after surviving an attempt to end her own life alongside her terminally ill husband Dennis in 2017. Joy had this to say upon hearing this news:

“I am glad that Parliament has finally listened to calls from my family and others affected by the injustice of our current laws … When my Dad was dying in agony from bowel cancer, he desperately wanted to die on his own terms with his family around him… But he was denied that option. I urge members of the Committee to ask themselves how they can possibly conclude that the law is working well when this is the impact it has.”

Kit Malthouse MP, co-chair of the All-Parliamentary Group on Choice at the End of Life highlighted that the “challenge for the Committee, especially those who have been opposed in the past, is to put themselves at the bedside with their constituents who have been through such horror, listen to them objectively and examine the evidence on whether the current law is serving the public – and primarily dying people and their families – as it should.” 

Every day, dying people are being forced to make impossible decisions between suffering, suicide or seeking the compassion of another country. The message from the public to politicians couldn’t be simpler: you cannot ignore this any longer. MPs on the Committee must consider the consequences of inaction and harms caused by the current law. 

Change is coming to the British Isles. Just last week the Isle of Man announced a public consultation on assisted dying legislation, Jersey is moving ahead with its proposals for change, and Scotland’s Assisted Dying Bill recently secured double the number of MSPs required to begin its parliamentary journey next year. We are all part of the same fight. 

I’ll be in touch later in the week with more information about how you can respond to the Commons inquiry, so do keep an eye on your inbox! For now though, take a moment to be proud of what you have accomplished and of the movement that you make possible. I’m so grateful to you for every action you’ve taken to help get us to this point.