Meeting of the Parliament 06 November 2025
I thank my friend for his intervention. I could not agree more. Despite all the immense work that hospices and our national health service do, too many people are simply stripped of dignity at the end of their lives. Too many people are robbed of the ability to die at home, rather than in a horrible clinical setting in a hospital.
That does not have to be the world that we live in. Marie Curie made a number of recommendations in its report that would help us to alleviate poverty and dying and to take the burdens off those in their end-of-life journey. One way would be for the Scottish Government and local authorities to work together to exempt terminally ill people from paying council tax, similar to the Manchester discretionary council tax support scheme. That would lift the financial burden for those close to death and would be a small step in creating a state that cares actively for those who are dying and recognises the struggles that they are going through by minimising the stress of what is an already impossible situation to come to terms with.
I realise that I have only touched on the initial findings of this fine report. I am sure that colleagues from across the chamber will highlight its other important findings during the debate.
It is important to stress that we in the chamber have the power to end the scourge of end-of-life poverty. It could happen to a family member or a friend of ours, or it could be us—who knows? We can build a social security system that is once again a truly cradle-to-grave system of protection. If we do not do that, the consequence will be that large numbers of our fellow Scots will continue to suffer the humiliation and indignity of suffering at the end of life.
I thank Marie Curie and Loughborough University for releasing the preliminary findings ahead of the publication of the full report, “Dying in Poverty in Scotland 2025”, to enable us to have the debate this evening. I look forward to hearing contributions from across the chamber that show a united resolve to end end-of-life poverty in Scotland once and for all.
17:08