YouSaid · the spoken record
Naz Shah
We hold 73 passages that may be Naz Shah’s. We do not publish them until we can confirm who spoke. See the correction.
On the record 2015–2026
hansard · podcast
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“Following on from my intervention on the hon. Member for Great Yarmouth (Rupert Lowe), I have looked at the issue of stunning. I have heard from a slaughterhouse that, particularly for lambs—chickens are slightly different—the same method is used, with the same level of electricity, for stunned meat and halal. Even with chickens, the difference is actually very slight. The same legislative practice applies to the majority of chickens that are stunned. Does the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr (Ayoub Khan) share my concern that we are focusing on a minute number here? Ultimately, it is very disheartening that people say they are absolutely mortified to see people are eating halal meat; they would be even more mortified if they knew the real issues.”
House of Commons9 June 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and the actions he has taken. I also welcome the Prime Minister’s joint statement yesterday. The word “genocide” is used quite often here, and all indicators point towards that happening. I appreciate the suspension of negotiations on a free trade agreement, but children are still dying every single day, and people are losing their homes. What will it take? What do we have to wait for to call it what it is and act to stop what is happening?”
House of Commons20 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that there will only be three hours for a panel, and that the first and second doctors might not actually know the patient or have met them? Their ability to spot coercion will be very limited.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“At that point, Ministers, outlining their neutrality, said that the amendments tabled, for which many colleagues had argued, were not, in the Government’s opinion, workable. In the Government’s opinion, what has now changed? Has an assessment been made by my hon. Friend or the Government that these amendments could now be accepted? What this speaks to—I emphasise this to all Members listening and to the public at home—is a fundamentally flawed process. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] This is not how we make legislation. I take my responsibility extremely seriously, as I am sure everybody in this House does. This is literally a matter of life and death. If the Bill passes without these safeguards, there is no coming back from those decisions.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank Members for supporting amendments 14 and 38 in my name. I acknowledge that the promoter of the Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater), has said that she is happy, as of this morning, to accept my amendment 14. My hon. Friend has also indicated that there might be a need to change some of the wording, but until I see the wording of the new amendment and can scrutinise it, I cannot make an informed choice about accepting that. In addition, I was told this at only 9.30 am, on the Floor of the House. It was not discussed with me, and I am not sure whether the promoter has discussed it with Ministers. This very argument has been hashed out in Committee, where many of us spent weeks and weeks scrutinising line by line. Indeed, the promoter tabled her own amendment 181 in Committee to strengthen clause 2.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is the problem with this Bill, this process and what we are being told. We are being given things on the face of the Bill—”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. My amendment 14 is very much about anorexia. It has been debated and hashed out time and again. I have come to the House today and been told, while sitting in my seat, that my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley is minded to accept the amendment without any discussion. I do not know what risk assessments or other assessments the Government have made, so how can I speak to that amendment when I do not have those details? I can say that Chelsea Roff, an expert on anorexia, gave evidence to the Committee. I can talk about how clinicians from every single major charity for eating disorders have made it clear that if this Bill goes through, it will not be fit for purpose and people will fall through that loophole. Without the information in front of me, however, I cannot speak to the amendment.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Spen Valley accepts my first amendment in its entirety, word for word, we do not close the loophole with amendment 38. What if we have somebody with diabetes? The hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Sarah Bool) spoke very passionately about diabetes. I know the experience, because I was gestationally diabetic on three occasions and dependent on insulin, and I also appreciate the risk of being a pre-diabetic. If somebody decides not to take insulin and that they do not want to have dialysis, they would bring themselves within the scope of this Bill as it is written. That is a fact. Contrary to the many people who have been on the radio and in other places saying, “The Bill excludes people’s mental health”, this Bill does not, as it is written, say that mental health is excluded. [Hon.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will make some progress. I sincerely appreciate the guidance from you, Madam Deputy Speaker, from Mr Speaker and from all across this House—the Clerks have been really helpful. I come back to the amendments. In Oregon, in the States, 60 women were given assisted death. Every single one of them—100%—were told that they had the capacity. We have an issue in this country. Some 11 cases have gone to the Court of Protection, and my understanding is that nine of them have been told that they do not have the capacity, but doctors have been given permission not to continue to feed them. That is an issue for us; there is an issue of capacity. There is a second issue in relation to amendment 38, which I will speak to. Even if my hon.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“No, I will make progress. I am very conscious that lots of colleagues are here. I remember that we were all sitting here in November the first time that we debated this Bill; more than 100 Members did not get to speak in that debate, and many people might not get to speak today. I feel really disheartened. As other Members who were on the Committee have pointed out, we have spent so much time rehashing these arguments. There were opportunities to fix this Bill rather than me and others having to put down amendments, taking up time and not giving those who would otherwise have spoken the opportunity to speak.”
House of Commons16 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Seventy-seven years since the Nakba, Israel’s illegal occupation eats away at the land. We now have—I will repeat these words loud and clear—“plausible genocide” according to the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court, Amnesty International and the United Nations. Given this week’s news, what new assessments have been made, and how often, to determine what other actions we can take to stop what is happening to the Gazans—the children, the civilians, and the aid workers—and to make sure that we can get aid in? What other pressures and levers can the Government use, including as part of a bloc, together with international partners and others, in addition to recognising Palestine? Surely that recognition is long overdue.”
House of Commons14 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Twenty six people lost their lives in the Pahalgam terrorist attack, and now 26 people lost their lives in yesterday’s attack. The truth remains that no evidence has been presented to anybody—any national or international partners—to say that Pakistan was, indeed, responsible for the attack on Pahalgam. I thank the Minister for coming so soon to the House and for all his efforts in trying to de-escalate. But to actually get de-escalation, and if India is so certain, does he agree that India should share that evidence with the world to justify this barbaric attack killing 26 people and attacking mosques in the middle of the night?”
House of Commons7 May 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I first send my condolences, thoughts and prayers to all the victims of this heinous terrorist attack in occupied Kashmir? There is a large Kashmiri diaspora in my constituency, and many of my constituents have reached out to me expressing deep concerns. A number of them have mentioned the Indus waters treaty. Pakistan has already been suffering from the effects of floods in past years, from which it has not recovered. At times of escalation and troubles such as this it seems to be communities at large, be they in India or Pakistan, who suffer. What message can the Minister give my constituents to reassure them that the UK is doing all it can to de-escalate, bring things back to normal and hold the perpetrators to account?”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will the Minister at least commit to going away and reviewing the decision and give the Palestinians the state recognition that they are way overdue?”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“May I place on record my thanks to the Minister for all the work that he and the Secretary of State are doing on the MOU, which is very welcome? On the question asked by my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, I appreciate that we stood on that manifesto, and rightly so, but things have since changed. The Government’s position was that we would continue recognition as part of the peace process, but Israel has been blocking aid to Gaza for 50 days now, people are starting to die of starvation, settler violence is increasing in the west bank and we now have an MOU, so is this not the right time to review our position?”
House of Commons29 April 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Spen Valley previously accepted an amendment—I think it was amendment 477—”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That brings me to a potential third way, which is what amendment 537 is about: charities. Charities are one way of addressing the concerns I and the hon. Member for Richmond Park have outlined about the risk with private companies and the risk of loss of confidence and access to the NHS, as well as the concerns outlined by the Royal College of General Practitioners. They could well be mitigated by ensuring that the lead responsibility for administering assisted dying is given to charities rather than the NHS.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When we were discussing this option, he told me really clearly that she has opted for a cremation, which would cost less money, just because she internalised that idea of burden and she did not want a cost for those that she left behind. She had not seen a doctor for 40 years. That brought home the idea of internalised coercion, internalised pressure and mistrust, because he also talked about what happened during covid. We had an interesting conversation. I told him that it was interesting that he had said that, and today I am talking about it. That is the reality: it is about how people perceive healthcare provision, the potential inequalities, and what the barriers are to access—all the preconceived ideas that we have about the provision of healthcare.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“After talking to the patients in ethnic minority and other disadvantaged groups, she said: “Overwhelmingly, racialised communities expressed deep concerns that they would be more likely to be pushed towards AD through systemic biases and societal attitudes about whose lives are valued… While safeguards were acknowledged, many remained sceptical that they would be applied fairly and equitably, fearing that vulnerable individuals, particularly those who lack strong advocates or English proficiency, might be at greater risk of being guided towards AD rather than offered appropriate care options.” I want to share something with the Committee. We often get taxis to and from work and home; I got into a cab yesterday, and the chap who was driving was called Dave. His 84-year-old aunt died on Friday.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Another option is for the NHS to fund a specialised assisted dying service that would be separate from its other functions. That could potentially be feasible, but it could also represent a significant cost for the NHS, because we still have not had the impact assessment from the Government and we have no idea how significant that cost may be. There is also the worry that if assisted dying becomes available on the NHS, some people will become too frightened to access palliative care, as was outlined to the Committee by Dr Jamilla Hussain. I will read a brief part of her written evidence to the Committee.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Royal College of General Practitioners said in its written evidence that “any assisted dying service should be seen as a standalone specialised service that healthcare professionals may opt to provide with additional training and should not be deemed core GP work.” The royal college’s advice, which is founded on the views of its members, means that we should give very strong consideration to putting assisted dying outside the normal workings of the NHS. If we do that, it seems that there are a few options. One is for the Secretary of State to invite private firms to tender for contracts and administer assisted dying services. As I have said, there are very strong reasons why we should not plan to have private firms work under contract to the NHS to provide assisted dying; for me, that it is one of the worst possible options.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I strongly support the general principle that if we do have assisted dying, it should be free at the point of use. If this House decides that people do indeed have the right to an assisted death under the conditions that this Bill sets out, then it should not be something limited to those who can afford private healthcare. There are, however, strong objections among general practitioners to providing assisted dying as part of their services, and I do not think we should plan to have private firms work under contract from the NHS to provide assisted dying either.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is interesting to follow the hon. Member for Richmond Park, because I rise to speak to amendment 537, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley. The amendment goes further than the hon. Member for Richmond Park would as far as local authorities are concerned. The amendment also concerns both the national health service and the provision of healthcare by charities. My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley knows both fields extremely well. She was the director of quality and strategy and chief analyst at the Department of Health, and then had a senior role at the Centre for Ageing Better. Her amendment would mean that assisted dying services could be provided only by charitable organisations and not by the national health service.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend says that this will be explicitly commissioned. I completely agree with everything he has said, but this will be a newly designed service by definition, so will that not leave the door open for new providers, such as Serco or G4S, to come in, design a new service and bring in the expertise to deliver it?”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We are spending hours and hours going through hypotheticals and possibilities—this could happen, that could happen—but there is nothing actually before us.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I stopped myself intervening on my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland Central; I had lots of questions, and he has confused me even more. He referred to the provision in clause 8(6)(d) about the doctors being different. If I am right, healthcare providers such as Aspire or Ramsay Health Care could be commissioned to deliver the services. If so, does that mean, as the hon. Member for East Wiltshire suggested, that we will need two separate doctors or providers because the co-ordinating doctor and the second doctor cannot be linked? That confuses me even further. After what we have heard this morning, it strikes me that we do not have any proposed model and the measure has not been thought through. It speaks to the idea that this is not right.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. I have observed two things this morning. First, the reality has really hit home. Are we going to look at the amendment regarding local authorities providing the service? Are we excluding private providers? Are we excluding big firms? A new service has to be designed. Will it be two organisations or one? How will the Bill be delivered? We do not even have that before us, and that concerns me deeply.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“However, I must ask: why does the Bill say that the Secretary of State “may” pass such regulations? The best interpretation I can think of is that a future Health Secretary might decide that private firms should provide assisted dying services directly to paying customers rather than via outsourced NHS contracts. In that case, the Health Secretary would need to provide regulations for those private sector services. If that interpretation is correct, surely we could have tighter wording. For example, the new clause could say that if the Secretary of State decides to allow private firms to provide assisted dying to paying customers, the Secretary of State must make regulations to govern that. I would welcome clarification on the point, because I know that my hon.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“To make such a fundamental change to the NHS, we should have had the best possible evidence and proper consultation, not three days of witness hearings and then hundreds of pieces of written evidence, often published after we had finished discussing the topics to which they relate. That is nowhere near good enough. The next set of powers that I want to talk about is mentioned in subsection (3) of new clause 36, which says that the Health Secretary “may by regulations make other provision about voluntary assisted dying services in England (whether or not the services are commissioned VAD services).” I absolutely accept that if we have assisted dying services in England, the Health Secretary should ensure that they are properly regulated. That will have to include privately provided services as well as those offered on the NHS.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think that, to prevent that happening, my hon. Friend has proposed subsection (1) of new clause 36. If there is any other reason why she has suggested that we should give those powers to the Secretary of State, it is important that the Committee understands and hears it. What is proposed underlines just how major a change the Bill would make. Since the NHS started operations in 1948, we have had a clear understanding of what it is there for. The 2006 Act is little different from the 1946 Act in that respect. For nearly 80 years, we have had an NHS that is there to improve health and to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of illnesses. The fact that we may have to change that shows us that we are taking a very big step indeed.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Those duties have been the basis of how the NHS has been run for the nearly eight decades for which it has existed. My hon. Friend’s Bill would give the Secretary of State powers to change the duties set out in section 1(1) of the 2006 Act. I ask my hon. Friend and both Ministers why the Bill needs to give the Secretary of State those powers. The only reason I can think of is that someone who was part of the drafting process has pointed out that the Health Secretary’s current duties might be incompatible with assisted dying. The Health Secretary has duties to secure improvement in the people’s physical and mental health and in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of physical and mental illness. Someone could bring a legal challenge on the basis that assisted dying does not fit with that duty, and that challenge might well succeed.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It states: “The Secretary of State must continue the promotion in England of a comprehensive health service designed to secure improvement— (a) in the physical and mental health of the people of England, and (b) in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of physical and mental illness.” That Act is an adaptation of the original National Health Service Act 1946, section 1(1) of which states: “It shall be the duty of the Minister of Health…to promote the establishment in England and Wales of a comprehensive health service designed to secure improvement in the physical and mental health of the people of England and Wales and the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of illness”. The 1946 and 2006 Acts both give the Health Secretary a very clear set of duties that I think we can all support.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As I understand it, the wording means that assisted dying services could be provided directly by the NHS or by private firms working on contract for the NHS. I will discuss those powers in the order in which I mentioned them. Subsection (4) of new clause 36 says that the Health Secretary may pass regulations that “may for example provide that specified references in the National Health Service Act 2006 to the health service continued under section 1(1) of that Act include references to commissioned VAD services.” To make it clear how the new clause works, I will quote from the subsection of the National Health Service Act 2006 that it would affect.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend explained, new clause 36 outlines the powers that the Secretary of State for Health would have over voluntary assisted dying services in England. New clause 37 does the same for Wales, but makes changes that are necessary because health is a devolved power. I will concentrate on new clause 36, as I represent a constituency in England. Put very simply, if new clause 36 is agreed to, it will give the Secretary of State three sorts of power. First, it will give the Health Secretary powers under subsection (4) to, effectively, change the National Health Service Act 2006. Secondly, it will give the Health Secretary powers to set out regulations about how any service, whether public or private, carries out assisted dying services. Thirdly, the Health Secretary will have powers under subsection (1) to commission assisted dying services.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Members have questioned other Members’ reasons for tabling amendments—but to suggest, as has been suggested today, that we are scaremongering, when we are actually going through the detail, is something else. I am afraid. This is not me scaremongering; this is me being afraid for women who are anorexic. This is a gendered Bill. There are amendments that I support because I want to strengthen the Bill. I genuinely do not think that the Bill, as it stands, has that strength. I feel disheartened that we are talking about what is going to happen on Third Reading and potential votes, when we should be concentrating on the amendments on the selection list. I oppose the new clauses tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley, which would replace clause 32. As my hon.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Absolutely. As a former commissioner, I am very familiar with commissioning; I commissioned millions of pounds’ worth of services across Bradford when I was in the NHS. The difference is that that was under Government Bills that had pre-consultation, impact assessments and a model that was debated. None of that has happened with this Bill. I agree that in an ideal world the process set out in new clauses 36 and 37 would be the right one, but without an impact assessment and a consultation, I am afraid that I have been left really disheartened. I am disheartened about something else, too. I thank all Committee members, regardless of the points that they have or have not made, for the way in which the debate has been conducted, both before and during our sittings. On a few occasions, hon.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Serco was eventually fined £23 million for fraud and false accounting; G4S was fined £44 million for the same scandal, but that only happened in 2020, seven years after its fraud was first revealed. These two companies committed fraud against the taxpayer worth tens of millions of pounds.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“They will need to hire doctors and other specialist staff. They will need the facilities to transport and store lethal drugs. We are almost certainly going to see the same old big four outsourcing companies bidding for these contracts. That would be a major problem, because the big four have a terrible record. I apologise for not being able to give a complete list of the scandals in which these four firms have been involved while running Government contracts—after all, time is limited—but it is worth mentioning a few. In 2013, both Serco and G4S were found to have spent years keeping inaccurate records on how they tagged and monitored dangerous criminals. As a result, they had overcharged the Government by tens of millions of pounds.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Take a specialist activity like running immigration processing. There is no existing market. That means there are few plausible bidders outside of a handful of huge multinational outsourcing firms.” It means, as Freedman notes, that the UK’s outsourcing market is dominated by the big four: Serco, Capita, Atos and G4S. There must be a very good chance that these companies will end up bidding for assisted dying services. Freedman gives immigration processing as an example of a complex service in which there are not going to be a lot of companies making good, competitive bids. Assisted dying is even more complex than immigration processing, and it is even more important to get it right. To bid for assisted dying services, companies will need experience in securing complex Government contracts. They will need very good legal advice.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“First, there need to be many firms or public organisations competing to offer a service. Secondly, the regulator needs to be able to measure clearly whether the firms have delivered the service to a good standard. Finally, “government needs to be able to hand over most of the risk of failure—if the taxpayer is still on the hook for picking the costs if things go wrong then the premium paid to private firms is not justified.” There are fields in which Government contracts do meet those criteria and outsourcing works very well—cleaning services, for example. There are some diagnostic or therapeutic services in the NHS for which private firms can make a genuinely competitive offer. A lot of the time, however, that does not happen: “For more complex services, though, often none of these criteria apply.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Now, free at point of use doesn’t preclude the use of independent contractors to deliver the service. So, yeah, we’re comfortable with that.” Unfortunately, we have seen major failings in the way private firms handle important contracts given to them by the Government. Those failings have happened under all three major parties in England and Wales. I want to quote from an excellent book by Sam Freedman, “Failed State”, which is not about some foreign country but about our own. I should say that Sam Freedman was a special adviser to Michael Gove under the Conservative Government, so he is not someone on the far left. Chapter 3 of the book, which concerns outsourcing, is entitled “Contract Killing”. It says that outsourcing contracts can work well if three conditions are met.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“However, it is not only private sector healthcare firms that are likely to bid for any future assisted dying contract. There are other firms with a good chance of winning those contracts that we should be very concerned about. The Minister for Care has made it clear that the Government are considering using private firms for assisted dying. He gave an important interview on assisted dying to PoliticsHome , which was published on 11 March. He said that my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley “has said that she wants this service to be an integral part of the NHS, meaning free at the point of use. Certainly the advice that we as ministers have given her is we’ve clearly understood that that is her wish, and that is a wish that can be delivered and carried out.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Giving the Health Secretary the power to commission private firms to work as contractors to provide assisted dying would perhaps solve that problem, with skilled healthcare professionals working in the private sector. In an interview with The Guardian on 10 January, the Health Secretary said: “Where there is spare capacity in the independent sector we will use it. We have agreed that we will work with them, and they will work with us to cut NHS waiting times…At the same time the independent sector has to pull its weight. It’s got to be genuinely additional capacity. I’m entirely pragmatic about this”. I agree entirely with my right hon. Friend that where there is genuine capacity in the private sector to help the NHS to complete its tasks, we should of course use that capacity.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For example, the Royal College of General Practitioners said in its written evidence TIAB 108 that it “does not believe that, if assisted dying is legalised, the process should be integrated into existing care pathways as part of the standard care and treatment they provide i.e. assisted dying should not be deemed core GP work…As such, we consider that if assisted dying is legalised the Bill should make provision to establish a separate Assisted Dying service. This may help to ensure that assisted dying was not a core part of GP work and that any doctor who did not want to be involved would not be forced to do so.” There is a problem here.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Finally, we come to what I think is the most important part of new clause 36: the powers in subsection (1) to commission assisted dying services. How the Secretary of State uses those powers will be crucial to the transparency of the system and to the impact of assisted dying on the NHS. We do not know whether the Health Secretary will contract private firms to provide services to the NHS or whether all assisted dying will be provided under the NHS. We do know, however, that many parts of the medical profession are strongly alarmed by the idea that the NHS would provide assisted dying.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Harris, for what might be the last time on this Bill Committee. When we adjourned this morning, I was speaking to new clauses 36 and 37. To bring us up to speed, I will repeat my last paragraph. If the interpretation that I suggested this morning is correct, surely we could have tighter wording. For example, the new clause could say that if the Secretary of State decides to allow private firms to provide assisted dying to paying customers, the Secretary of State must make regulations to govern that. I would welcome clarification from my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley on whether she would be minded to accept such an amendment, given that she accepted a change from “may” to “must” in previous amendments.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I will get back to the point, Mrs Harris. Serco and G4S carried on getting huge public contracts because the Government found it too hard to replace them. Assisted dying would also be a specialised service.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Some of them do, or they deliver parts of healthcare. Any company can bid or design a service to recruit doctors, as I said earlier. That is the reason I mention these companies. Big companies already do provide some services to our NHS, albeit that they may be in different areas at the moment.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Would companies be paid a fee for each stage of the assisted dying process that they have provided: one fee for providing the first assessment by a doctor, another for a second assessment and so on, up until the final fee for helping the patient take the lethal drugs? As I said this morning, we do not know what the proposal for the structure is. That is why it is important that we explore and understand the risks of every structure. There are Government services that we can safely outsource. Assessing whether people are fit to end their life is not one of them, and neither is helping people to take lethal drugs. These clauses will enable future Governments to open up lucrative contracts for assisted dying that will almost certainly be won by companies that have often been incompetent and have potentially been dishonest.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am happy to, Mrs Harris. We should be determined not to see big outsourcing companies bidding for assisted dying contracts and then potentially misusing them the way in which they have misused other public services. That is not because I am opposed to firms operating in a free market or making money when they do their job well; it is because the way we run outsourced Government contracts in this country often has nothing to do with the free market and nothing to do with companies working well. Finally, we need to ask hard questions about how the contracts for assisted dying would be structured.”
House of Commons25 March 2025Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗