Palliative care doctor Dr Rachel Clarke has criticised MPs' decision to back assisted dying legislation in England and Wales. She accused the government of neglecting care funding, saying it prioritises making death easier over improving lives. Clarke called the move shameful, arguing that the lack of investment in care services undermines the dignity and quality of life for those in need. Report by Covellm. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00The elephant in the room here, and I put this directly to Wes Streeting and Keir Starmer, is this.
00:09What on earth are you doing, being the Prime Minister and the Health Secretary,
00:15who may oversee a state-funded assisted dying service,
00:21while acknowledging that some people are choosing to die or want to die
00:28because palliative care isn't there for them?
00:31How can you, your legacy as Prime Minister and Health Secretary,
00:37be making it easier for people to die while not funding the care that could make life worth living?
00:44I think that's a disgrace. If that was my legacy, I'd be ashamed for the rest of my political life.
00:50It's hard to emphasise enough how threadbare and patchy and a kind of Cinderella service
00:57palliative care is in the UK today.
01:00The majority of it isn't even funded by the NHS, it's funded by charities.
01:06And it means things like hospices in deficit having to close their beds
01:12because they can't afford to employ nurses.
01:15Or in hospitals, such as my hospital, we don't even have a seven-day palliative care service.
01:22At weekends, for two days every week, you get no palliative care nurses, no palliative care doctors.
01:30And that's a national scandal.
01:32We should be providing proper palliative care for everybody who's facing the end of their life,
01:39not leave it up to a postcode lottery.