Doctors to speak out against changes to proposed assisted dying law in England and Wales
Doctors are preparing to speak out against changes to the proposed assisted dying law that could ban physicians from raising the procedures with patients,The British Medical Association, which will give evidence to a committee of MPs scrutinising Kim Leadbeater’s private member’s bill, has said doctors must be allowed to raise assisted dying sensitively with patients if it becomes law,The BMA said it would be “an unacceptable intrusion of legislation into the privacy of the consulting room”,The Guardian has previously reported that up to 30 MPs who backed assisted dying could withdraw their support at the next parliamentary vote,At the top of MPs’ demands for change is that the bill should not permit medical professionals to suggest assisted dying to terminally ill patients.
MPs, including the former cabinet minister David Davis and the Labour MPs Chris Webb and Mike Tapp – who voted for the bill – have asked the committee to consider making this change,A source close to the committee said it was likely to be one of the first amendments considered by the committee in February once they had finished taking public evidence,MPs scrutinising assisted dying legislation will have three full days in the final week of January to hear public evidence from health and ethics experts and begin to explore a range of possible amendment,The committee will then meet twice weekly for public scrutiny sessions of the bill until the last week of April,The BMA’s official position is neutral on whether assisted dying should pass – but the union has agreed a collective position that doctors should not be put in the position where they are barred from raising it with patients.
Dr Andrew Green, the chair of the BMA’s medical ethics committee, which leads on assisted dying, said that barring doctors from raising the option with patients would put unprecedented legal restriction on doctors – though he said no doctor should be obliged to mention the procedure,“After careful debate, we did conclude that there should be no requirement on doctors to raise the subject, but equally, they should be able to do so sensitively when they thought it was in the best interest of their patients,” he told the Guardian,“Some patients do find it difficult to bring up sensitive subjects in their consultations, and doctors are skilled at reading between the lines of what patients say and working out what has been left unsaid,“In such circumstances, a skilled doctor would gently open the door to those conversations, allowing the patient to walk through into a safe space where they can discuss what’s on their mind,The amendment under discussion would result in a lock being put on that door to effective communication.
And we feel it would be an unacceptable intrusion of legislation into the privacy of the consulting room.”Green said that he would not anticipate that assisted dying would ever be directly recommended to patients and that doctors would continue to be bound by the code of ethics.The BMA is expected to be among the organisations called to give evidence to the committee in the last week of January.The next Commons debate and vote is expected to be on 25 April – and should time allow, the bill may also get to its final Commons stage that day.If the time limit is reached, the final stage of third reading would take place on the next sitting Friday, about a fortnight later.
Proponents of the bill are hopeful it will start its consideration in the Lords before the summer.The bill’s committee will have nine MPs who were opponents of the bill, including its most high-profile Conservative opponent, Danny Kruger, and 11 MPs who were in favour.The health minister Stephen Kinnock and the justice minister Sarah Sackman will be on the bill committee for its next stage in parliament.They voted in favour of the bill.Along with Leadbeater, that makes the committee balanced 14-9 in favour, a 60% majority.
Bank of England delays rules designed to avoid banking crash by a year
The Bank of England will further delay capital rules meant to prevent another 2008-style crash, as it weighs the impact of Donald Trump’s return to the White House and the chancellor Rachel Reeves’s call for regulators to help drive UK growth.The Bank’s regulatory arm said it was delaying the date by which banks had to implement Basel 3.1 rules by a year, to January 2027.The Bank’s regulator, the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), said it made the decision after consulting with the Treasury, and that it had taken “competitive and growth considerations” into account.It marks the third delay by the central bank, which is buying time to see how far the Trump administration will go in watering down regulations
IMF upgrades UK growth forecast and takes swipe at Trump plans
The International Monetary Fund has upgraded its forecast for UK growth this year in an update to its biannual assessment of the global economy, while taking a swipe at plans by Donald Trump’s incoming US administration for the potentially destabilising effect of large-scale tax cuts, import tariffs and weaker regulations.In a fillip to the Labour government, the Washington-based organisation said it expected the UK economy to grow by 1.6% in 2025, up from an earlier forecast of 1.5%.The IMF judged that Labour’s increase in investment spending, improved household finances and a series of interest rate cuts by the Bank of England would give the UK economy a lift this year
EU asks X for internal documents about algorithms as it steps up investigation
The European Commission has asked X to hand over internal documents about its algorithms, as it steps up its investigation into whether Elon Musk’s social media platform has breached EU rules on content moderation.The EU’s executive branch told the company it wanted to see internal documentation about its “recommender system”, which makes content suggestions to users, and any recent changes made to it, by 15 February.X has been under investigation since December 2023 under the EU’s content law – known as the Digital Services Act (DSA) – over how it tackles the spread of illegal content and information manipulation. The company has been accused of manipulating the platform’s systems to give far-right posts and politicians greater visibility over other political groups.The EU has come under growing pressure in recent weeks to take action after a series of interventions by Musk into European politics
Labour’s investment in AI isn’t as clever as it thinks it is | Letters
There are at least three major concerns to raise with the government’s apparent betting the future of the UK on so-called artificial intelligence (‘Mainlined into UK’s veins’: Labour announces huge public rollout of AI, 12 January).The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more.First, as Prof Shannon Vallor at the University of Edinburgh has pointed out in her book The AI Mirror, generative AI is not creative; it only looks backward
Lindsey Vonn’s ‘impossible’ comeback roars on with 2026 Olympics in frame
She’s past 40 with a knee made of titanium, but Lindsey Vonn’s comeback is already bucking expectations and crackling with the promise of a fifth Olympic GamesThere’s no denying the nervous apprehension that rippled through the ski racing world after Lindsey Vonn announced her shock comeback in November. She’d walked away nearly six years earlier due to a battered right knee worn down by a string of gruesome crashes and multiple surgeries, no longer able to endure the punishing demands of the circuit. Now she was proposing a return on the wrong side of 40 with a knee made of titanium to a high-risk sport where no woman has ever won a top-flight race past 34 years old.But a funny thing happened on the way to Vonn’s humiliation. In the two months since her unretirement, she’s finished 14th in a super-G at St Moritz, before improving to sixth and fourth in her next two races at St Anton
Jack Draper goes the distance again to beat Vukic and set up Alcaraz clash
Throughout the early days of Jack Draper’s young career, questions around his physical preparedness for his chosen sport followed him wherever he went. As he continually struggled with injuries and endurance issues alike, Draper never failed to hear from those who believe he did not work hard enough, carry himself with sufficient professionalism or care enough about his craft.Those days are over. Forever. For the third straight match in Melbourne, despite his stunted preparation and the rust that caked his game, Draper made his commitment and passion plain to see as he left everything out on the court and somehow found a way to drag himself across the finishing line of yet another frantic five-set match he seemed destined to lose, drawing on his endless reserves of grit and heart in the process
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