Individual choice should be key to assisted dying debate

Nicola Sturgeon argues that if we normalise assisted dying then we will lose focus on palliative and end-of-life care. Ms Sturgeon is entitled to her opinion, be it right or wrong. She should not, however, be entitled to deny individual choice to a growing majority of people in this country.

I nursed my father through the cruel, degenerative disease of cancer which ravaged his body. No amount of love, palliative care or morphine could alleviate his slow, agonising death towards the end. He insisted on having one weekend alone to reflect. After “giving him peace” for one night, I visited him the next day to find him lying in bed in a pool of blood but still alive. He’d tried five times to commit suicide. In five different ways. He was not physically strong enough to succeed.

Had an assisted dying bill been passed, my dad would have been able to have a warm, comfortable death in his own bed at a time of his choosing, surrounded by family. Which would you choose?

Gail Kirkland

Bowmore, Islay

THE letter written by Dr Calum MacKellar (April 2) prompts me to state the following fairly obvious points:

Firstly, he admits that his own religious belief is based on faith and not observable evidence. I guess the real reason he is motivated to hold those beliefs is that they make him feel pleased.

Secondly, if that is the case, the best we can say about such beliefs is that they lie somewhere on a range between probable and improbable. In that context, it is therefore inappropriate to use the terms “True” and “False”.

Thirdly, since there are a considerable number of religious beliefs – and many more have existed in the past – which each have their own precise details, we can therefore say with some confidence that even if one of those beliefs is correct in the majority of its details, the remainder cannot possibly be so at the same time. At that detailed level, therefore, those other beliefs must be classified as somewhat improbable.

Fourthly, MacKellar (below right) states that “this belief [presumably his own belief] .... must be believed for a civilised society to survive.”. He may be interested to know that that is precisely the opposite of the belief that I hold.

Fifthly, it is the competitive basis for religious faiths and our instinctive inherited behaviour which, in the early stages of our evolution, do indeed ensure our continued survival, a progression towards being more intelligent, but in the longer run guarantee our eventual extinction.

a. Confronted by evidence that this globe is on a pathway to self-extinction due to climate change, our political leaders (mostly) have turned for advice, not to experts in the factors which govern that change of climate, but to experts in business and finance which have persuaded them to hasten the process of the climate towards its being uninhabitable, by extracting, and releasing into our atmosphere, still more greenhouse exhaust gases.

b. Thus far the absence of any hint of the existence of other intelligent living organisms elsewhere within this universe. You would think, would you not, that any intelligent life-forms would discover how to broadcast TV and radio programs which would then advertise their current or past existence for us to detect – unless, of course, that existence was very (very) short-lived. I do hope that suggested expectation is incorrect.

Note: I have read the honeyed self-congratulatory words written by MacKellar about kindness etc. but I am also aware of the actuality which is clearly and currently observable in the Ukraine, the Middle East, in the Far East, in the Caribbean, and also in various forms of social, religious and class hatreds, etc.

Hugh Noble

Appin

(Dr MacKellar gave us his credentials so I’ll do a selection of mine: 1. Postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of AI at Edinburgh University and a supporter of the notion that the human mind is almost certainly a computer made of meat rather than metal. 2. Antarctic glaciologist and contributor to the British Antarctic Survey Research during the International Geophysical Year (1957) with a research programme designed to throw light on what seems to be happening to our climate.)

IN response to Dr MacKellar’s pronouncement on palliative care and the flaws in Pat Kane’s argument, I have several questions to which he might care to respond.

Firstly, can he elucidate further on his dismissal of “meat machine”? This is an opinion without evidence thus far.

Secondly, is he seriously promulgating the old argument that freedom from pain – which he cannot guarantee unless he induces coma, and even then he might only have imposed the inability to express reaction to pain – equates to quality of life? I myself suffer occasionally from near-unbearable pain which, thankfully, is too brief to affect my overall quality of existence, but I am not looking forward to the day it does.

Thirdly, where is the logic in the dismissal of the fact that when my pain does become unbearable, I will be at the mercy of judgemental busybodies like himself? Due to my professional experience, I hope to be able to anticipate incapacity and permanently remove myself from the suffering induced not only by the pain but also by the fact that it is destroying my ability to indulge in the activities which make this existence bearable in the first place. However, in Dr MacKellar’s world, if I am incapable of committing suicide, I will be at the mercy of those who believe that they have more rights over my life than I do.

If my dog is suffering, I can, as in the past, break my own heart by ending her suffering. Who is Dr MacKellar, or anybody else, to tell me that I cannot do the same for my loved ones, with, of course, their explicit agreement?

Les Hunter (retired nurse of some 42 years’ experience)

Lanark

AS the issue of the SNP not accepting places in the House of Lords has recently been appearing in both the columns and letters of your newspaper, readers of The National may be interested in the origin of this long-held SNP position.

The question emerged at the monthly meeting of the National Executive Committee on October 18, 1974. At this meeting, Banffshire MP Hamish Watt gave a report on behalf of the parliamentary group. He stated that by a margin of 10 votes to one, the MPs had agreed to submit names for peerages, seeing it as “a tactical move in the circumstances of the new parliament”. This was a week after a general election had seen the Nationalists reach a new high of 11 MPs.

Back in 1974, the only SNP MP opposed to accepting peerages was Donald Stewart, the MP for the Western Isles and leader of the parliamentary group. He argued against SNP places in the Lords for three reasons – the House of Lords is undemocratic; it would make the SNP part of the establishment, and it would give the impression that the SNP want permanent rather than temporary membership of the British parliament. Winnie Ewing expressed the opposite view – she believed the SNP should engage in all stages of the legislative process. In October 1974, Ewing’s view prevailed among her fellow MPs, however – as Hamish Watt found when he represented the parliamentary group at the NEC – the position of Donald Stewart was more in tune with the feelings of the party leadership.

The NEC, by a margin of 11 votes to 3, instructed the parliamentary group not to submit any names for peerages.

The MPs respected the authority of the NEC so that was almost the end of the matter. The issue was debated again at a meeting of the SNP National Council in June 1975.

A motion was debated which called on the SNP to sit in the Lords. It was defeated by a large majority, meaning a show of hands from delegates in the conference hall was so substantial a vote count was not required.

Nearly half a century has passed since these events and at no time since has any SNP member accepted a place in the House of Lords. It is perhaps a little surprising that the SNP have not done more to highlight this.

At a time when many voters see politicians as in politics for what they can get out of it for themselves, it should be mentioned more often that the SNP could have had places in the Lords for nearly half a century but have had enough principle not to take any.

Ewen Cameron

Glasgow

IN his column of March 31, Tommy Sheppard made a good argument against the first-past-the-post voting system used in Westminster elections. He explains well that the largest minority often is elected, thus ignoring the views of other candidates or parties. He then states that “the SNP support a proportional voting system where the results reflect the votes cast by the people”. I am in agreement that the Holyrood system is superior to a wholly first-past-the-post system.

However, Tommy, doesn’t the Holyrood system use the same first-past-the-post voting system to elect our majority constituency MSPs? But I hear you say our second vote addresses this with the D’Hondt system which produces a parliament roughly in proportional representation. So all is okay? I agree ours is a better system than Westminster, but who would advocate a voting system with a flawed major first part covered up with a secondary veneer? Don’t try a dodgy undercoat then wonder why the gloss leaves a patchy finish.

Why don’t you advocate for the proportional representation used in our local council elections, Tommy? My ward has four proportionally elected councillors representing a wider range of views. Unfortunately, our council is not controlled by the SNP. Is this why you don’t advocate this system for Holyrood?

One other issue is sovereignty. Hopefully in an independent Scotland, our people will have our sovereignty written into our constitution.

To achieve this in practice, our political parties will need to cede power to a proactive electorate. Your article makes no mention of any such moves. The parliamentary democracy you advocate seems to result in political parties supporting systems which favour themselves best. The Tories and Labour for first-past-the-post and the SNP for the Holyrood system! Maybe we need more power to the people!

Campbell Anderson

Edinburgh

WE wake to another story of the mess of a privatised water company in England and the greed that has left more essential infrastructure teetering on the brink of collapse.

This time it’s Thames Water and the vast loans that may be called in by Chinese and Dutch banks as investors, who’ve not got the dividends they want for – who knows – a new yacht – financially abandon the company they have hollowed out.

Those who spout pretend patriotism; those who use xenophobia and jingoism as an election tool are the very same people happy to see UK infrastructure sold to foreign interests for private profit.

It’s not just the water that stinks …

Amanda Baker

Edinburgh