by Naomi Phillips, Head of Public Affairs, British Humanist Association

Following a thorough and independent inquiry, the Commission on Assisted Dying’s principal finding is that the law on assisted dying is ‘inadequate and incoherent’ and that ‘there is a strong case for providing the choice of assisted dying for terminally ill people’. The Commission has made a number of recommendations in its report necessary to facilitate a change in the law to legalise assisted dying while at the same time protecting vulnerable people.

Commenting on the report, the British Humanist Association’s (BHA) Chief Executive, Andrew Copson, stated, ‘The law as it stands is not compassionate. It gives no option to those who wish to end their lives without suffering and distress but are unable to do so themselves. The majority of the public support a reform in the law, and we do not believe there are any credible arguments to keep the law as it is. Rational and compassionate people will surely find nothing to disapprove of in the recommendations of the Commission today.’

Certainly, a change in the law is long overdue and urgent to prevent any more unnecessary suffering for those few people who have made a clear and resolute wish to end their lives but are unable to do so themselves – and the Commission’s considered, detailed, sensitive, and academic report makes a strong case for legal reform.

Case for wider reform

However, when we were called to give oral evidence to the inquiry (watch here) and in our written evidencewe made the case for a wider reform of the law. From an ethical perspective, we maintain that there is no strong moral case to limit assistance to terminally ill people alone and ultimately we wish to see reform of the law that would be responsive to the needs of other people who are permanently and incurably suffering. We also think that there are good arguments from compassion and from autonomy to legalise assisted dying and voluntary euthanasia, where the latter would allow someone other than the patient to administer medication needed to end her life, if she were unable to do so herself and had clearly stated that was her wish.

In light of that position, Mr Copson continued, ‘If anything, we would have liked to have seen the Commission go further and recommend a greater change in the law to allow both assisted dying and voluntary euthanasia. There is no rational moral distinction between allowing someone to die and actively assisting them to die in these circumstances: the intention and the outcome (the death of the patient) are the same in both cases. The only difference is that the more active means is probably the more compassionate one.

‘Recommending only a limited reform in the law to allow assisted dying but not voluntary euthanasia, and only to encompass terminally ill people rather than also including people who are unable to end their own lives but who are incurably suffering, permanently incapacitated and have made a clear, informed and resolute decision that they wish to do so, is ethically inconsistent.’

What can be done – and who opposes reform?

However, this is not to downplay the enormous and positive impact that a reform in the law would make for terminally ill people, and for their families who, at the moment, are being faced with the immensely difficult choices of whether, knowing that it is unlawful, to assist a loved one who is begging for help to put an end to their suffering or not to act and hence prolong their suffering.

But as the report makes clear, this is an issue that parliament needs to legislate on for change to happen. And despite the fact that survey after survey shows that a majority of people – whether religious or non-religious – support a reform in the law to legalise assisted dying (see figures ‘On Assisted Dying’), many MPs and Peers are resistant to speak out or to support change. When there are so many good, ethical reasons to support a reform in the law, why is there such reluctance amongst our elected representatives to act?

From our experience of working for reform in the area of assisted dying for many years, we can attest to the level of misinformation and emotionally charged campaigning conducted by those who oppose reform. It is clear that well-funded, organised, but disproportionate and unrepresentative lobbying and protestations from religious and other oppositional organisations, and the organised and influential opposition to reform by the 26 Church of England Lord Bishops in parliament, have a distorting, negative impact on the debate, severely retarding progress to take the law in a more ethical direction.

Of course it is not only religious people who form the minority opposition to reform on assisted dying (as above, most religious people support legal reform) – but it is the unrepresentative, often socially conservative religious lobby which is most vociferous in opposing a change in the law, just as it is in campaigning against issues such as the right to abortion and stem cell research (both issues that also command wide public support). The majority of members of the Care Not Killing alliance – the group which has been most vocal in opposing the Commission on Assisted Dying – are religious organisations, most are Christian. And most other prominent opponents come from a similar, conservative, religious perspective.

We will continue to campaign hard against the small but vocal lobby who oppose changing the law to allow, with strict safeguards, those who are suffering to die with dignity at a time of their own choosing. It would be a great shame if their largely unshared beliefs continued to have undue influence over our elected representatives, to come above the needs and rights of terminally ill patients, and to stand in the way of real reform. We urgently need a law on assisted dying that is sensible, ethical, humane, forward-thinking and that upholds people’s fundamental human right to die with dignity and in a manner of their choosing.

The Guardian reports that fantasy writer Terry Pratchett says he has received consent forms requesting assisted suicide but has not yet signed them. He states:

“The only thing stopping me [signing them] is that I have made this film and I have a bloody book to finish.”

Read the full report here.

Hey kids, it’s the Easter break! Long weekend! Wanna go ride the rides at Alton Towers?

Yaaaay! Thanks dad.

Not only that, kids, it’s “EXTREME EASTER” at the park. And one of these lucky vicars, pictured during their auditions in my Daily Mail, will be leaading the EXTREME EASTER service. It’s EXTREME!

Vicars' EXTREME EASTER at Alton Towers - "is designed to address the problem of falling church numbers in the UK by offering visitors a chance to worship at the popular attractions."

Oh… Thanks dad. Actually, isn’t Doctor Who on?

* * *

Andrew “dodgy dossier” Gilligan does a bit more digging, this time bringing to the surface an old document from the occasionally described as moderate Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) stating that wearing the burqa is “not up for debate” (this quote appears in the byline but not in Gilligan’s article).

The Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) said that not covering the face is a “shortcoming” and suggested that any Muslims who advocate being uncovered could be guilty of rejecting Islam.

In a statement published on its website the MCB, warns: “We advise all Muslims to exercise extreme caution on this issue, since denying any part of Islam may lead to disbelief.

“Not practising something enjoined by Allah and his Messenger… is a shortcoming. Denying it is much more serious.”

The statement quotes from the Koran: “It is not for a believer, man or woman, that they should have any option in their decision when Allah and his Messenger have decreed a matter.”

* * *

In an audacious move, Cristina Odone pulls a blinder in a bid to make it into our new “God delusions” round-up. First she  delivers surely the earliest THEY’RE BANNING CHRISTMAS comment of the year (a new record?). Then she dons the cloak of victimhood and whines unhappily… about how atheists will never be happy! With no sense of irony at all.

The two issues are linked, of course. You see, atheists won’t be happy until Christmas is banned and Cristina Odone has been driven into “the catacombs”.

Well, at least she’s half right.

* * *

Finally, in a beautiful conflation of multiple kinds of stupid, on the day that Cristina Odone also loudly protests the alleged claim by Discworld author Terry Pratchett that those against assisted dying are on the “far right”, Melanie “Mad Mel” Philips blames assisted dying on “the Left (and the BBC)”.

An upcoming BBC documentary, Choosing to Die, featuring Sir Terry Pratchett is due out later this year. Pratchett will discuss attitudes and the legal position across Europe and talk to terminally ill patients who want to end their lives at a time of their choosing, possibly with assistance from others.

There is huge support for legalising assisted dying in the UK (ComRes) (also see Times poll and YouGov and Angus Reid for figures in Scotland, where Margo MacDonald’s pro-reform bill was recently defeated anyway). If nothing else surely this level of support for reform mandates the license-payer funded BBC to do a bit of coverage on it. But Care Not Killing said: “The BBC is acting like a cheerleader for legalising assisted suicide.”

However, Sarah Wootton, chief executive of campaign group Dignity in Dying, warned: “I believe it is irresponsible not to be discussing this issue. People are taking desperate decisions at the end of their lives; travelling abroad to die or attempting to end their lives at home, often alone for fear of their loved ones facing prosecution.”

Link: http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/uk/Row-over-39righttodie39-film.6752687.jp

The BBC‘s commissioning editor for documentaries, Charlotte Moore, said: “Assisted death is an important topic of debate in the UK, and this is a chance for the BBC2 audience to follow Sir Terry as he wrestles with the difficult issues that many across Britain are also faced with. I hope this sparks a constructive debate that people across the spectrum of opinion can engage in.”

Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/apr/15/terry-pratchett-documentary-assisted-suicide

Meanwhile, the Daily Mail is alarmed (for a change) that “Britons are travelling in record numbers to kill themselves at the Dignitas suicide clinic in Switzerland”. These “record figures” are based on a tiny sample – rates at which it only takes a few people to add a significant percentage – and compares the last three years’ average with the previous six years’ average, indicating that right or wrong the change probably isn’t so fast.

The number of British suicides at the Zurich clinic has risen from an average of 14 a year between 2002 and 2007 to a total of 76 – about 25 a year – from 2008-2010.

Link: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1377924/Britons-die-Dignitas-suicide-clinic-record-numbers.html

Sir Patrick Stewart is the latest celebrity to back reform, becoming a patron of Dignity in Dying, alongside humanist Ian McEwan. Stewart said that choosing to die should be a human right:

Speaking publicly for the first time about his membership of Dignity in Dying, Stewart referred to a recent tragedy involving a friend, as well as his own diagnosis of having coronary heart disease five years ago. “I am reluctant to go into details. Enough to say this person was driven to an extreme situation of ending their own life in the most ghastly way,” he said of the friend. “There’s got to be an alternative when someone is suffering so badly and is ready to go.”

Asked if he believed that the choice of ending one’s life should be a human right, he replied: “yes”, adding: “Everything that medicine can do to keep somebody alive doesn’t automatically follow as the best option.”

Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/apr/17/star-trek-actor-backs-euthanasia

His Discworld books have been read in her household for years, she tells us, but now that Terry Pratchett disagrees with her own view on assisted dying, Cristina Odone “loathes” the author. Quite personally.

Of course,  that would sound churlish. So she tries to blame the disagreement specifically on him attributing the no-to-assisted-dying position to the “far right”.

But ever since I heard Pratchett claim that only the “far Right” had any objections to assisted suicide [link in the original], I have loathed him. For a man blessed with such talent and success, who wields an influence on so many young people, to rubbish life so publicly is disgraceful. For him to misrepresent as “far Right” those who oppose legalising assisted suicide is downright dishonest.

Did you know Pratchett had said that? No? You’re not alone.

The article Odone links doesn’t contain this phrase, nor does the video embedded in the page, though Pratchett seems to have made the comment in an interview with Jon Snow on Channel 4 News. At the time when it was filmed and shown (early last year) this comment seems to have been taken as a fairly light-hearted accusation from a man who, as a sufferer of Alzheimers, has a very personal stake in the debate, and the comment was largely ignored, including during the interview by Jon Snow. A search does turn up one response to the “far right” comment by Dominic Lawson. Lawson is able to turn it into the basis of an entire article in which we learn about how those “fanatical” pro-assisted-dying lot are always painting the antis as far right extremists. There are no other examples given.

So Odone’s “loathing” is supposedly based on one comment from over a year ago, inflated originally by one commentator, and now picked over again by herself. “It is of course a favourite trick of the media-savvy Liberal Left,” she tells us, “painting their opponents on any issue as Right-wing extremists.” Again, no other examples are on offer.

Meanwhile, while loudly protesting about Pratchett’s single comic ad hominem and ostensibly writing about the rhetorical ploy of offering false attacks on those you disagree with, Odone goes on to offer several for Pratchett. She describes his position on assisted dying as being to “rubbish life”, says he suffers from an “emotional autism”, and finally decides that “For him, men (and women) are autonomous beings devoid of the connections that make life worth living.”

Anyone who’s heard Pratchett talking about why life, and the right for those suffering to end it, are important, would surely find it hard to support Odone’s interpretation of his position and motivation.

Moreover, it must be like waking up for a dream for Cristina Odone! Presumably she now regrets that her family wasted all that time reading all those life-denying, cold and un-funny, emotionally dead books full of disconnected characters in Pratchett’s meaningless world?

Link: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/cristinaodone/100084004/sir-terry-pratchett-poster-boy-of-assisted-suicide-has-the-bbc-doing-his-bidding/

Margo MacDonald has pledged she will try again to legalise assisted suicide if she is re-elected to the Scottish Parliament, after her controversial End of Life Assistance Bill was overwhelmingly rejected by MSPs.

Her bid to make Scotland the first part of the UK to change the law was defeated 85-16 in a free vote that allowed MSPs to vote with their consciences and not along party lines.

Ms MacDonald said the outcome was what she had expected. She added: “A few people continued to say we shouldn’t even debate it in this Parliament. That is what Parliament is for.

“Of course Parliament’s will must be respected, but Parliament’s will can change.”

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/politics/msps-reject-bill-legalising-the-right-to-die-1.1072005

The Scottish Parliament is expected to reject new laws giving terminally ill people the right to choose when to die, despite claims they are widely backed.

Independent MSP Margo MacDonald’s End of Life Assistance Bill aims to make it legal for someone to seek help to end their life.

Ms MacDonald, who has Parkinson’s disease, has claimed there is wide public support for the legislation.

But it is thought the bill will not pass its first parliamentary vote.

MSPs have been allowed a free vote on the bill, rather than on party lines, and it has been supported by a number of members from across the Holyrood parties.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-11876821

An inquiry into assisted dying has been launched with funding from author Sir Terry Pratchett, a supporter of helping terminally ill people end their lives.

But Lord Falconer, who is chairing the Commission On Assisted Dying, said it would be “objective, dispassionate and authoritative”.

It will receive evidence from experts and the public before publishing a report in December 2011.

Earlier this year the Crown Prosecution Service issues new guidelines.

The clarification of the law, issued in February came after right-to-die campaigner Debbie Purdy, who has multiple sclerosis, took her case to the House of Lords after the High Court and Court of Appeal held it was for Parliament, not the courts, to change the law.

Ms Purdy, from Bradford, West Yorkshire, wanted to know if her Cuban husband, Omar Puente, would be prosecuted if he helped her travel to Switzerland to end her life.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11875323

MARGO MacDonald today urged MSPs to heed the strength of public opinion behind her “right-to-die” bill when it is debated in Holyrood this Thursday after polls showed an approval rating of 77 per cent.

The independent Lothians MSP, who has Parkinson’s disease, is championing the End of Life Assistance Bill which would allow people whose lives had become intolerable because of terminal illness or a degenerative condition to ask for help to end their lives.

A VisionCritical poll of 1001 Scots was announced today revealing that 77 per cent of those questioned on the matter were in favour of some form of euthanasia for the terminally ill. Only 12 per cent were against with 11 per cent undecided.

Ms MacDonald said she hoped MSPs would recognise the groundswell of support for her bill, which is at an early stage of legislation, and allow it to progress. She also criticised an opposition group Care Not Killing for “distorting” details of the bill.

Full article: http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/Margo-MacDonald-takes-heart-from.6636018.jp

A Holyrood committee has recommended that a bill to legalise assisted suicide should be thrown out.

Independent MSP Margo MacDonald is behind the End of Life Assistance Bill, which would give terminally ill people over 16 the right to die.

The committee looking at the bill said it found no case for changing the law. The bill will now be debated by MSPs.

Ms MacDonald wants to give “autonomy” over how people die but opponents say it would encourage suicide tourism.

They believe the move would result in 1,000 people ending their lives each year.

However, Ms MacDonald, who has Parkinsons disease, dismissed the claims and said it was immoral that those who wished to end their lives due to terminal illnesses should have to travel to Switzerland.

The MSP for the Lothians has also accused fellow MSPs of making up their minds before hearing the evidence.

Continues: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-11781981

The Humanist Society of Scotland responds:

The HSS supports Margo MacDonald’s End of Life Assistance Bill because it provides a choice for those people who seek to end their lives with dignity and the protection of the law. It will be debated in the Scottish Parliament on Thursday, November 25th, and it’s more important than ever that we show our support.

… The Scottish public backs [Margo MacDonald] too. Since the start of her campaign, Margo’s had hundreds of letters, two thirds of which support her bill, and for more than a decade, opinion polls have shown that two-thirds of the population support the principle of physician-assisted suicide.

Don’t let the committee kill the bill. There are three things you can do.

• Send a letter to your MSP
• Sign our Petition to the Scottish Parliament
• Come to the debate and show your suppport.

The Stage One Debate will be at the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood on November 25th. It starts at 2.55 p.m. and ends at 5.00 p.m. There are 200 seats in the public gallery and you can book yours here or by calling the Parliament on 0131 348 5000

http://www.humanism-scotland.org.uk/news/let-me-choose-dont-kill-the-bill-2.html

Western Australia would be the first state in Australia to initiate opt-out organ donor laws, if a new proposal underway in the state is successfully passed. At the current point of time the only such law in Australia is an opt-in program, in which a person has to opt-in, in order to automatically donate their organs after death.

At the current point of time, there are only 16% people living in Western Australia, who are a part of the national organ donor register. If the proposal is passed, then all Western Australians would have to automatically donate their organs for transplant, until unless they sign an opt-out form to withdraw their consent from organ donation.

Continues: http://www.topnews.co.uk/214736-donor-laws-witness-sea-change-western-australia

The old, ill, mute and frail will be deemed expendable if assisted suicide is legalised, a thinktank says today. Society’s most vulnerable risk being bullied into an early death by greedy or uncaring relatives or bureaucrats, according to a study published by the Centre for Policy Studies.

The warning follows the launch of Healthcare Professionals for Change last week, the first professional body of doctors and nurses set up with the explicit aim of changing the 1961 Suicide Act.

Assisted suicide is a criminal offence in England and Wales, punishable by up to 14 years in prison, but the motives of those assisting death are at the centre of the decision over whether they should be prosecuted.

Cristina Odone, author of Assisted Suicide: how the chattering classes have got it wrong, said any attempts to change the law should be resisted.

“Legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia will put the socially marginalised at serious risk. Attempts to change the law should be resisted,” she said.

Continues: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/18/thinktank-against-legalising-assisted-suicide

More here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/8070180/I-refused-to-help-my-father-die.html

The British Humanist Association has responded that the report is “unhelpful scaremongering”.

A tribute to Claire Rayner on Tuesday’s Today programme.

Agony aunt Claire Rayner has died at the age of 79.

Her son Jay pays tribute to the woman who has featured on daytime TV and radio for decades.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9083000/9083017.stm

It must be Terry Pratchett’s latest book! I Shall Wear Midnight continues the young adult series of Discworld novels that star young witch, Tiffany Aching.

Now she’s 16, and she has assumed all the burdens of being The Chalk’s witch — and they are burdensome — delivering the babies, salving the wounds, clipping the neglected old ladies’ toenails, changing the bandages, and using magic to take away the pain of the Baron, who is dying.

As if being thrust into an early maturity wasn’t enough, witchery has fallen into disrepute on The Chalk — and seemingly everywhere. There are old ladies being crushed and drowned by mobs, there are the whispers and the forked fingers to fight the evil eye when Tiffany passes, and then, when the Baron dies while Tiffany eases him into the next world, there is the wildfire rumor that Tiffany killed him.

What Tiffany learns is that a shade of an old witchburner, called the Cunning Man, has been summoned to the world. Where the Cunning Man walks, poison follows — poison against witches, against the odd, against foreigners, against the out-of-place. The Cunning Man is shambling evil, a corruption that goes into all the places that welcome poison, all the dark and ugly corners of our minds.

Full review by Cory Doctorow: http://www.boingboing.net/2010/10/12/pratchetts-i-shall-w.html

Leading doctors who endorse assisted dying for the terminally ill will this week launch an unprecedented campaign to change the law on the right to die.

Healthcare Professionals for Change, a group of doctors, nurses and allied health professionals, says it wants to challenge bodies such as the British Medical Association, which opposes any change in the law that would allow others to help terminally ill people to die.

The group is the first professional body of its kind to be set up with the explicit aim of changing the 1961 Suicide Act, which forbids such assistance.

The group will be chaired by Dr Ann McPherson, a GP and fellow of the Royal College of General Practitioners and of Green College, Oxford, who is dying of pancreatic cancer. “By taking a hostile approach to a change in the law on assisted dying, medical bodies such as the BMA and the Royal College of Physicians are failing to adequately reflect the views of all their members,” she said. “Many of us believe dying patients should not have to suffer against their wishes at the end of life. Alongside access to good quality end-of-life care, we believe that terminally ill, mentally competent patients should be able to choose an assisted death, subject to safeguards.”

Continues: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/03/right-to-die-assisted-suicide

The British Humanist Association campaigns for reform of the law on assisted dying.

Religious leaders will this week mount a concerted attack on proposals to help the terminally ill die with dignity, warning MSPs they would devalue human life, pervert the doctor-patient relationship and become a “cover for murder”.

The assault by church and faith groups is aimed at sinking the most contentious legislation ever brought before Holyrood – Margo MacDonald’s End of Life Assistance (Scotland) Bill.

The Independent MSP for Lothians, who has the serious degenerative disorder Parkinson’s disease, wants terminally ill people over 16 to be able to die at a time of their own choosing.

Two requests separated by a “cooling off” period would have to be approved by a doctor and psychiatrist before a fatal drug was given by consenting medical staff. To prevent so-called “death tourism”, only those registered with a Scottish GP for 18 months could apply.

The bill promises safeguards to prevent abuse of vulnerable people, with those suffering from dementia excluded from the procedure.

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/politics/religious-leaders-attack-proposal-for-the-right-to-die-1.1056051

A 54-year-old engineering executive who suffered a massive stroke and lives “locked-in”, able only to move his head and eyes, today [Monday] launched a legal attempt to allow his wife to kill him.

Tony Nicklinson wants the director of public prosecutions to give guidance on whether the Crown would press murder charges against his wife if she administered a lethal injection. The case could reach the supreme court in a landmark attempt to have the law on murder changed to allow for “consensual killing”.

Nicklinson is not terminally ill and is not in pain, but he has said he expects to “dribble his way into old age” and is “fed up” with his life. In a statement placed before the court, he says he wishes he had died when he suffered a stroke while on business in Athens in 2005.

The former rugby player used to work in the United Arab Emirates and travelled across the Middle East and far east before he fell ill but is now fed liquidised food twice a day and almost never leaves his home in Wiltshire. He has stopped talking to most people as it is so frustrating to communicate using an alphabet board.

“I need help in almost every aspect of my life,” he said in a statement sent to the court today”I cannot scratch if I itch, I cannot pick my nose if it is blocked and I can only eat if I am fed like a baby – only I won’t grow out of it, unlike the baby. I have no privacy or dignity left. I am washed, dressed and put to bed by carers who are, after all, still strangers.

“I am fed up with my life and don’t want to spend the next 20 years or so like this. Am I grateful that the Athens doctors saved my life? No, I am not. If I had my time again, and knew then what I know now, I would not have called the ambulance but let nature take its course.”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/jul/19/locked-in-syndrome-die-dpp

The BHA campaigns for the legalisation of assisted dying for the terminally ill.

Jean Davies tells us why Ludovic Kennedy, the author and journalist, is her Humanist Hero.

Ludovic Kennedy

My humanist hero is Ludovic Kennedy. I’ll never forget the opening words of his Memorial Meeting in Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford last November. “We are here to celebrate the life of a great man. Ludovic was a four-square atheist.” The speaker was one of the most senior Church of England dignitaries on the staff of the Cathedral.

Ludo’s book All in the Mind – a Farewell to God (1999) is every bit as compelling as The God Delusion in revealing the absurdity of postulating the existence of God on the basis of no evidence whatsoever. In this book Ludovic explores the idea that it is time to see God as just a man made creation that is there just to satisfy needs that we have. The book is also a personal account of Kennedy’s thought processes as he became less involved with the Church and became an atheist.

Kennedy played major role in the abolition of capital punishment. One of the most influential ways that he did this was through his book 10 Rillington Place.  This book was about the life of Timothy Evans. His wife and daughter, on moving to the eponymous address, were murdered and Evans was arrested and hung. In 10 Rillington Place Kennedy gives evidence that it was not Evans who was the murderer but the landlord. With the help of this book, Evans was granted a posthumous pardon from the Queen in 1966. He once told me that this book was the only one of his books that had never been out of print.

Ludovic spent years looking into miscarriages of justice. He also presented the current affairs programme Panorama for several years and used his broadcasting platform to highlight the campaign against capital punishment.

After success with abolishing capital punishment, years later he concentrated on campaingning for reform of the law on assisted dying. Kennedy was a great contributer to the Voluntary Euthanasia Society as a co-founder and former chair. He attended most Committee meetings, even though he had no vote. His strong views on legalising euthanasia led him to resign from the Liberal Democrat party after Charles Kennedy would not take a pro-euthanasia stance.

Ludovic Kennedy died last year. See the obituary from the BHA.

This post is part of a series written by members, friends and Distinguished Supporters of the British Humanist Association about their own “humanist heroes”.

You can find out more at www.humanism.org.uk/humanism/humanist-tradition/heroes

Jean has been a BHA member for many years and spoken at national and international Humanist conferences. Jean has been a humanist representative on her local SACRE for a number of years.

Pepper Harrow celebrates actor Dirk Bogarde, who did what he could without being “soppy and pious”

Dirk Bogarde

Sir Dirk Bogarde may not have called himself a humanist, but he did repeatedly reject the notion of God and campaigned tirelessly on many issues close to humanist causes. His experience in World War 2 cemented his assertion that he was “done with God.”

In a career that spanned seven decades, his artistic achievements and contribution to cinema should earn the title of ‘hero’ alone, yet he also had a series of successful novels and autobiographies as well as campaigning for various good causes.

His film career included work with some of the most celebrated directors in that period of artistic cinematic history and included films about issues that frightened the more mainstream Hollywood studios. Many believe that these decisions left him unable to continue the film star status and lifestyle that he enjoyed during his early career, yet Bogarde’s insistence that stories about issues such as homosexuality and the holocaust not only deserved to be told, but deserved to be told well, says much about his integrity as an actor.

For example, the landmark film Victim (1961) left him open to professional and personal attack as it depicted a prominent homosexual barrister in London who fights the blackmailers of a young man with whom he had an emotional relationship. This film helped to highlight the issue of homosexual repression in a new and accessible format with a leading man who was known to millions via an already highly successful career. He rewrote much of the most important dialogue in the key scenes and was later to receive many letters from gay men thanking him for his honest portrayal. Despite this, for reasons that possibly stem from both his financial need to retain the ability to work and the need for some degree of privacy, he never openly admitted that his manager for over 40 years was in fact his partner, although this has been confirmed by family members since his death.

His campaigning for social reform took many forms but he was most active in the assisted dying movement. Having seen wounded men suffer in the second world war and then watched his partner die from cancer and Parkinson’s simultaneously, he became a Vice President of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society, now known as Dignity in Dying. In his own words, Bogarde’s later life was spent,

making use of my life in the only way I can, that is by helping people one way or another without being soppy and pious.

His incredible life including childhood adventures, a world war, stardom, art, nature, literature and social activism combined with his compassion and humanity proves him to be a humanist hero.

This post is part of a series written by members, friends and Distinguished Supporters of the British Humanist Association about their own “humanist heroes”.

You can find out more at www.humanism.org.uk/humanism/humanist-tradition/heroes

Pepper Harrow joined the BHA in 2007 and works on the BHA’s campaigns with a particular focus on equality, human rights and community.

I respect Jane Campbell and others’ desire to prolong their lives and make no judgment call on anyone else’s quality of life. Sadly, I feel this respect is not always reciprocated. Her argument against assisted dying for terminally ill people when distilled is no different from those who trump the sanctity of life above the wishes of those who want to have the choice of an assisted death. Campbell and other anti-choice campaigners seek not only to judge the quality of my death, but to impose their views on me and many others at the end of life – a survey of 3,000 deaths by Professor Clive Seale found that almost one in 10 dying patients asked for help to die.

I am dying of pancreatic cancer. I wish I wasn’t. But dying isn’t a failure on my part, it is part of life. I wish to live as long as possible, but not at the expense of enduring an undignified death. In the final days or weeks of my life, if I consider my suffering to be unbearable, I would like the choice to die at home at a time of my choosing surrounded by my loved ones.

Full article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/09/assisted-death-should-be-respected

A new campaign by disability rights activists to limit the right to die launches at Westminster on Thursday.

The campaign – called Not Dead Yet UK Resistance – will be asking MPs to sign a charter in support of its aims.

It says that disabled and terminally ill people should enjoy the same legal protection as everyone else.

Those in favour of assisted suicide argue that opposing assisted suicide will condemn terminally-ill people to suffer needlessly.

The Not Dead Yet UK’s charter includes a commitment to oppose any changes to existing laws which state that assisting a patient to commit suicide is illegal.

The campaigners claim that the prevailing view is that disabled people’s lives are not worth living, and that this contradicts the perception that many disabled people have of themselves.

Their charter also states that disabled and terminally-ill people should have access to the health and social care that they need.

http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8718581.stm

The BHA campaigns for the legalisation of assisted dying for the terminally ill.