Advance Directives, Euthanasia And Medical Ethics

EDM number 1335 in 1994-95, proposed by Nicholas Winterton on 30/06/1995.

That this House notes that in evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee on Medical Ethics the British Medical Association opposed legally binding living wills/advance directives; notes that because of potential misunderstandings, unreported changes of mind and pressures from doctors, relatives and legatees this view is shared by doctors from the hospice movement and other medical disciplines caring for the aged; notes the BMA Ethics Committee nevertheless has published a document accepting living wills as legally binding, warning that doctors declining to abide by them risk charges of assault although such directives may only be signed pre-printed cards, smart cards, or notes recorded in patients' files; notes that although that document has not been discussed by its Annual Conference, a BMA adviser on medical ethics writes in the British Medical Journal of 24th June that even 'conversational oral statements', such as conversing before television, are open to debate and that medical bodies should consider the conditions under which these should be binding; notes the disingenuity of claims by the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State that the Government is opposed to legalising euthanasia whilst asserting that living wills are legally binding in common law; invites the honourable Member for Bolton West to provide the House and the Lord Chancellor's Committee considering the Government's response to the flawed Law Commission Report on Mental Incapacity, with details of the authority for that assertion by listing each court decision in which an advance directive was held to be legally binding.

This motion has been signed by a total of 24 MPs, 1 of these signatures have been withdrawn.