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Terminally ill man wins the right to bring a High Court challenge over right-to-die law (18 April 2017)

Date: 18/04/2017
Duncan Lewis, Legal News Solicitors, Terminally ill man wins the right to bring a High Court challenge over right-to-die law

Noel Conway, a retired college lecturer with motor neuron disease, has won the right to bring a High Court challenge over the law on assisted dying.

Noel Conway, 67, asked the Court of Appeal to overturn a decision preventing a judicial review over the ban on providing a person with assistance to die. The Court of Appeal have reversed the previous ruling. Mr Conway has been supported by the organisation Dignity in Dying – a national campaign for everyone in the UK to have the right to a good death – who instructed Conway’s lawyers to seek permission for a judicial review.

Mr Conway was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in November 2014, his condition is incurable, and he is not expected to live for longer than 12 months. Mr Conway commented on his desire to end his life:

“I have lived my whole life on my own terms, in control of the choices and decisions I make. Why then, when I am facing my final months, should these rights be stripped away from me, leaving me at the mercy of a cruel illness? I know I am going to die anyway, but how and when should be up to me.”

Noel Conway used to enjoy a range of outdoor activities such as climbing, walking, skiing and cycling, but now requires a wheelchair, is dependent on a ventilator overnight and requires assistance in his daily activities such as dressing and eating.

Mr Conway is calling for a declaration that the Suicide Act 1961 which makes it a criminal offence to assist in a suicide – is incompatible with Articles 8 and 14 of the Human Rights Act. Article 8 relates to respect for private and family life and Article 14 protects from discrimination. Mr Conway will now get a judicial review of the 1961 Suicide Act.

Mr Conway’s request for judicial review was made not entirely for himself, but in the hope that other terminally ill adults who meet a strict criterion will be able to make decisions about ending their lives. Mr Conway believes that the option of an assisted death would provide him and many others with “great reassurance and comfort”.

A spokesman for the Care Not Killing Alliance, an alliance of organisations opposing euthanasia, commented “We are naturally disappointed that this case continues to drag on. If successful, it will usurp the democratic will of Parliament.” The Care Not Killing Alliance argues that the laws exist “to protect those who are sick, elderly, depressed or disabled from feeling obliged to end their lives.”

However, Sarah Wootton, chief executive of Dignity in Dying said the current law “simply does not work” and that Parliament must stop ignoring the “pleas of dying people”.

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