The Falconer Commission on ‘assisted dying’: Do not be fooled

‘An objective, dispassionate and authoritative analysis of the issues’ – this is what Lord Falconer claimed his Commission on ‘Assisted Dying’ would provide when it was launched back in 2009. He repeated the claim that his Commission was ‘completely independent’ on the Today programme this morning.

Don’t believe any of this for a second. Dr Peter Saunders has done sterling work in exposing the biased nature of this Commission.

Nine of the twelve members had already stated before the formation of the Commission that they were in favour of a change in the law to allow for ‘assisted dying’.

46 high profile individuals and over 40 organisations, including the British Medical Association, who were approached to give evidence to the Commission, refused on the basis that it was a sham.

So, the nature of Lord Falconer’s Commission is clearly not as he describes it to be. So what is actually going on?

Lord Falconer and his allies know that change comes through persistence. Parliament has, in recent years, refused to change the law on this issue three times in the UK in recent years. This report says nothing new. This is a campaign of attrition and much of the media fuels it by giving it high profile coverage.

Lord Falconer also knows that change happens incrementally. Many will see the report’s recommendations as ‘reasonable’ and sufficiently cautious. Do not be fooled. Dignity in Dying (the pro-euthanasia group who sponsored the Commission) and its supporters want euthanasia to be legal in this country. If the Commission’s recommendations are accepted, which we pray they will not, this will just be one step along the way to this aim.

The consequences are unthinkable. In Holland, where euthanasia is legal, 13,000 people are killed each year.

We must be aware that this is their game and stand resolutely against it. The people we don’t hear much from during the media debates are the thousands of elderly and vulnerable people in care homes up and down the country. We must stand and speak for them, particularly in an economic climate such as this, where elderly people do not want to ‘be a burden’ on their families.

I heard recently that many clergy are increasingly worried at observing the trend of quick and simple funerals, lasting no longer than 20 minutes and without an order of service. This is a chilling indication of the desperate need we have to rediscover the value of life until its end and even after it is over.

We must not remain silent and we must not be fooled by the few hard cases which the pro-euthanasia lobby use as the backbone of their campaign.

Life is precious, whatever its quality, because it is given to us by God as a gift, a God who Himself has come near in the Lord Jesus and is therefore well acquainted with suffering and grief and yet has given us hope by passing through death and overcoming death.

Andrea