Fearing being a burden ‘legitimate reason’ to seek assisted suicide, says Leadbeater

Kim Leadbeater has said that she “would not want to be a burden” during a podcast on the subject of her Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, which will be voted on by MPs this Friday.

In an interview on The News Agents (transcript at bottom of page), a daily podcast produced by Global Media & Entertainment, the Labour MP said that “being concerned about being a burden is a legitimate reason” to seek assisted suicide.

During the podcast, interviewer Lewis Goodall highlighted that in Canada, more than one-third of people receiving physician-assisted suicide reported they felt they were a perceived burden on family and caregivers.

Goodall then asked what would happen if someone wanted to end their life primarily because they felt like a burden, but still wished to proceed.

Leadbeater responded by stating, “Well, there is an argument that having personal choice and autonomy is part of the whole process.” She also acknowledged that “there are people who have said to me… surely being concerned about being a burden is a legitimate reason as well… I know I wouldn’t want to be a burden to people. I can say that to you now in the clear light of day.”

The comments come as there is mounting public concern that physician-assisted suicide could put vulnerable people at risk.

Writing in The Guardian, Diane Abbott and Edward Leigh, Britain’s two longest-serving MPs, voiced concerns that vulnerable minorities are “most likely to resign themselves to an assisted death against their will because they are unable to access the support they require”. 

The MPs also cited scenarios, similar to those raised with Leadbeater, where individuals could feel pressure to seek assisted suicide: “Imagine the pensioner whose children cannot afford houses of their own watching her limited savings, earmarked for those children, disappearing on social care and so feeling a ‘duty to die.’ Or consider the elderly widow who has been hospitalised and worries she is taking up a valuable bed in an NHS under significant strain and would be better off dead.”

Similarly, the human rights organisation Liberty has criticised the bill’s “principles first, details later” approach, warning it could lead to significant risks for marginalised and vulnerable groups. Additionally, 73 academics have signed an open letter raising concerns that the bill could open the door to the coercion of vulnerable individuals into ending their lives.

Medical professionals have also voiced opposition. A letter signed by 3,400 healthcare professionals—including 23 medical directors at hospices and NHS trusts, 53 eminent medical professors, and former Welsh chief medical officer Dame Deirdre Hine—stated that the law “would threaten society’s ability to safeguard vulnerable patients from abuse”.

In the interview, Leadbeater also appeared to hint that her bill to introduce assisted suicide could be expanded in the future, saying that Canada, which has a much broader set of criteria, is “nothing like we are proposing at the moment”.

Canada’s initial 2016 law closely mirrored Leadbeater’s proposed bill, allowing Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) for adults with a grievous and irremediable medical condition, experiencing unbearable suffering, and whose natural death was “reasonably foreseeable”.

However, in 2021, Canada expanded MAiD to include individuals whose death was not reasonably foreseeable, removing the requirement for patients to be terminally ill. Amendments also eliminated the minimum 10-day waiting period for those whose deaths were foreseeable. 

In 2023, Canadian lawmakers approved a provision to expand MAiD to individuals suffering solely from mental illness. Furthermore, the Canadian Special Joint Parliamentary Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying has recommended extending MAiD to minors.

When euthanasia and assisted suicide became legal in Canada in 2016, such deaths accounted for less than 0.6 per cent of all fatalities. By 2017, the figure had risen to 1 per cent. Quebec, the only province to release its 2023 data, reported that 7.3 per cent of all deaths were attributed to MAiD—the highest rate in the world.

The Bishops of England and Wales have urged Catholics to write to their MPs ahead of Friday’s vote, which can be done via the Right to Life UK website.

Transcript of the exchange between Kim Leadbeater and Lewis Goodall on The News Agents: 

GOODALL: Are you concerned that in a survey of Canadians who ended their lives under their system, which I accept is a different system, but none the less, although the vast majority did say that they wanted to die because they had lost their ability to engage in meaningful life activities, but more than one third did say their desire to do so was in part informed by a feeling that they were perceived burdens on their family friends or caregivers … I mean that’s a fact. 

LEADBEATER: Yeah, I mean you’re absolutely right, Canada, clearly a much broader set of criteria, nothing like we are proposing at the moment. Yea and I think that is the conversation which would take place so if someone is sitting there, saying, “I might as well just go, I’m being a burden to everyone,” the doctor will clearly pick up on that and say, “Hang on, this is about you and it’s about your choice.”

GOODALL: But if they say “I want to do that anyway,” would under your system still happen?

LEADBEATER: Well, there is an argument that having personal choice and autonomy is part of the whole process. However, they would have to be assessed as having the capacity and making sure that no-one else has coerced them into doing that. So I appreciate that is a very delicate issue. I mean, there are people who have said to me — I think my mum would probably say this to me — surely being concerned about being a burden is a legitimate reason as well, in terms of… I know I wouldn’t want to be a burden to people, I can say that to you now in the clear light of day. But that’s very different to people saying, “I’m doing this because I feel like I’m being a burden.”

(GETTY)

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