Meeting of the Parliament 17 March 2026 [Draft]
I, too, thank Liam McArthur for the approach that he has taken in engaging with members across the chamber, on both sides of the debate. I do not think that there is anybody better suited—either in temperament or in manner of engagement—to have brought such a sensitive and complex bill to the chamber, and I sincerely thank him for that.
I echo Liz Smith’s comment that this debate, throughout its stages—1, 2 and 3—has been an exceptional demonstration of this Parliament at its best. It is perhaps cheeky of me to say this as I leave this Parliament, and as someone who has been an MSP for 15 years and was in Government for 12 and has never once voted against the whip, but perhaps less whipping in this Parliament might not be a bad thing after all.
In what is likely to be my final speech as an MSP—other members have said this—I cannot think of a more consequential piece of legislation to be speaking to. In 15 years in this Parliament, I, like so many of my colleagues, have cast hundreds, if not thousands, of votes. Day after day, we come to this chamber and, more often than not, we vote as instructed by that slip of paper that is handed to us by our whips. However, today, there is no party line—no whip. Today, every member must be guided not by a slip of paper, but by the weight of their own conscience.
My conscience tells me this: a society that leaves someone with a terminal diagnosis believing that their only options are either to endure intolerable suffering or to end their life prematurely has failed them. I refuse to accept that those are the only two choices available. There must be a third one—one that gives people comfort, relief and, yes, dignity in their death—without sending the message that ending their life is the only option available to them.
As someone who has taken a number of bills through this Parliament—and, dare I say, one or two that have even courted some controversy—I know how carefully we must think about the unintended consequences of legislation, especially legislation such as this bill, which is born of good intentions. Over the years we have corrected bad law, we have amended acts and we have even repealed acts. This bill is different, however. When the unintended consequences are death, there is no correcting it afterwards. No repeal can reverse it, and no secondary legislation can undo it. Death is final.
Even many of the bill’s strongest supporters have had to concede that there is no absolute, cast-iron safeguard against coercion. Coercion is not always loud. It is not always an overt threat. Sometimes it is quieter than that. Sometimes it is a look, a sigh, a hesitation, a sense that you are a burden, a feeling that your family would simply be better off without you. That is what troubles me the most.
That is not to say that those who argue passionately for the right to an assisted death do not have a case; of course they do. We would have to have a heart of stone not to be moved by some of the testimony that we have heard. I know that from personal experience. When my uncle died from pancreatic cancer, aged 54, I washed his body in preparation for his funeral, as is our Islamic custom. He had been a stocky man—5 foot 8 and 13 stone—before his diagnosis. By the time he died, he weighed just 6.5 stone. As I washed him, I could feel his bones protruding through his skin. When he died, I felt grief and heartache, but I also felt relief that he was no longer suffering.
I therefore say this with real empathy for those who are facing terminal illness, pain, fear and loss of dignity. If, in giving a small minority this option, we create a law under which even one person ends their life because they feel guilty, dependent or like a burden, then the Parliament will not have made compassionate law; it will have made dangerous law.
When disabled people’s organisations and domestic abuse organisations and experts warn us, and when those who know what it is like to live with dependency tell us that this law could expose people to pressure that they may never name as coercion, we should not just hear them—we should listen to them.
To colleagues who remain undecided tonight, I simply say this. If you are not absolutely certain that this bill can protect those most at risk, then do not pass it. If even one person chooses death, not from true autonomy but from quiet pressure, that is one person too many.