Sir Keir Starmer has slapped down Wes Streeting after the Health Secretary said the NHS did not have the money to pay for assisted dying.
MPs made history last week by approving a bill which will give terminally ill adults in England and Wales with less than six months to live the right to end their own lives.
The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was passed by 314 votes to 291, and will now go to the House of Lords for further scrutiny.
But the bill has caused deep divisions in the Government. While Starmer backed it, the two Cabinet ministers whose departments will be most involved in implementing the changes – Streeting and the Justice Secretary, Shabana Mahmood – voted against them.
Starmer, who voted in favour of assisted dying, promised he would make the measure “workable in all its aspects”.
Speaking to journalists at the Nato summit in The Hague, the Prime Minister said: “It is my responsibility to make sure the bill is workable, and that means workable in all its aspects. I’m confident we’ve done that preparation.”
Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Wes Streeting, is against assisted dying (Photo: Thomas Krych/Anadolu via Getty)The Labour leader’s remarks contradict comments made by Streeting, in which the Health Secretary questioned whether the NHS could afford to pay for assisted dying.
In a message on his Facebook page last week, Streeting said he would “make sure that we do a good job with it for the country”, but worried that MPs had made the wrong choice.
He also said that introducing assisted dying to the NHS was unfunded.
“Even with the savings that might come from assisted dying if people take up the service – and it feels uncomfortable talking about savings in this context, to be honest – setting up this service will also take time and money that is in short supply,” he said.
“There isn’t a budget for this. Politics is about prioritising. It is a daily series of choices and trade-offs. I fear we’ve made the wrong one.”
In the spending review earlier this month, the NHS was given an extra £29bn in real terms day-to-day spending between 2023-24 and 2028-29.
The proportion of public spending going to health has ballooned in recent years, with the Department of Health and Social Care due to account for 41 per cent of all day-to-day spending in 2028-29, up from 39 per cent in 2024 and just 26 per cent in 2000-01.
Some politicians and economists have questioned how long this trend will be sustainable.
Peers will get a free vote on the legislation in the Lords, with supporters of assisted dying believing they have a majority in the chamber.
The bill says that implementation of assisted dying will take up to four years, meaning that it could be late 2029 by the time a terminally ill person can legally have an assisted death.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Starmer slaps down Streeting for saying there is ‘no budget’ for assisted dying )
Also on site :
- Kremlin reveals how Putin will take part in BRICS summit
- Faith leaders challenge Texas law requiring Ten Commandments in classrooms
- 'M3GAN’ Star, 37, Details ‘Profoundly Scary’ Experience She Encountered: 'Huge Trauma'