Isle of Man Legislative Council Reduces Assisted Dying Residency Requirement to One Year

The Legislative Council has agreed that the residency criteria for eligibility for an assisted death under proposed new Isle of Man laws should be one year, rather than five. Members of the Legislative Council (MLCs) supported an amendment by Rob Mercer to the Assisted Dying Bill 2023, which specified that a terminally ill individual must have resided on the island for at least a year prior to their diagnosis. Diane Kelsey’s proposition, requiring patients to be registered with a Manx GP, also received approval during the discussion of the bill’s clauses. However, a separate attempt to change the life expectancy criterion back to six months from the current 12 months, as originally proposed in the bill, was not supported. Members of the House of Keys had previously determined that adults with a prognosis of 12 months or less to live would be granted the right to choose to die. Those eligible would need to be over the age of 18 and have lived on the island for five years, with the decision requiring verification by two independent doctors. All 15 clauses of Alex Allinson MHK’s private member’s bill, which Peter Greenhill is guiding through the Manx parliament’s upper chamber, were debated. Paul Craine expressed concerns that some individuals might choose to relocate to the island after discovering “something not right” through private health care, before receiving an official diagnosis after a year of residency. Mercer stated that his amendment would enable those who had moved in “good faith” and subsequently become ill to make this choice, but would exclude anyone who had already received a diagnosis before arriving. He commented that the proposal “walked a fine line between providing compassion and addressing concerns” about what some had labelled “death tourism”. Advocating for a reduction in the life expectancy criterion, Craine claimed that “expert after expert” had indicated that doctors “simply cannot make judgements on whether a patient is reasonably expected to die within 12 months”. Conversely, Greenhill argued that some terminally ill patients would experience “severe physical and emotional distress” and should be allowed “to make that choice in a controlled and dignified way”. Kelsey remarked that the requirement for patients to be signed up with a local GP mirrored Kim Leadbeater’s Westminster bill and “felt like a very sensible addition”. The council rejected amendments that would have imposed restrictions on doctors who choose to opt in to the system, mandated the introduction of a social worker as a third person to assess a patient, and prohibited assisted deaths from taking place at Noble’s Hospital. The final reading of the bill in the Legislative Council is scheduled for the new year, before any changes are considered by the House of Keys.