Assisted dying campaigners are using Dignitas to distract from a flawed bill
13 June 2025, 10:07 | Updated: 13 June 2025, 10:33
Anyone closely following the debate surrounding Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide Bill over the past few months can’t have failed to notice how campaigners in favour of the Bill have increasingly made reference to Dignitas.
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Many of those campaigning for the Bill, including Leadbeater herself, Esther Rantzen and the campaign group Dignity in Dying, seem determined to propagate the notion that British airports are experiencing a stampede of Brits trying to make their way to Switzerland to end their lives.
The Daily Express, the only newspaper that has been reliably in Leadbeater’s corner, led with a front page splash in April declaring, “‘Concrete’ proof Britons want a right to die choice”, and an online version of the same story declared, “Shocking new figures show just how many Brits are joining Dignitas”. Reading these headlines, you’d think that there had been a dramatic increase in those heading to Dignitas to end their lives, potentially in the thousands!
However, a calm look through the actual data shows very clearly that the reality implied by the Daily Express headlines - that there has been a dramatic increase in Brits going to Switzerland to end their lives - is complete nonsense. So, just how many Brits are ending their lives at Dignitas? In 2024, it was 37. This was actually a fall from the 40 who went to Dignitas the year before. In 2015, the number was also 37. Over the past decade, the number of Brits travelling to Switzerland to end their lives at Dignitas has actually been remarkably static.
Leadbeater and her supporters seek to portray the narrative that there are huge numbers of Brits every year who are desperate to go to Dignitas. They claim that the Leadbeater Bill would be a game changer in supporting those who are determined to go down the assisted suicide route to die close to home, surrounded by their family.
Another issue here, as far as I can see, is that it seems highly likely that the bulk of those Brits who go to Dignitas every year to end their lives wouldn’t qualify under the Leadbeater Bill for an assisted death in England and Wales. What problem is the Leadbeater Bill actually seeking to solve for Brits who feel forced to go to Switzerland to secure an assisted death?
Even some assisted suicide campaigners admit that many people who travel to Dignitas would not be eligible for assisted suicide under the proposed laws here. Data mentioned in a press release from the assisted suicide campaign group, My Death, My Decision, that covers the diagnoses of the Brits who have travelled to Switzerland for an assisted death, shows that 49.6% who did so had a “neurological diagnosis”. The group says that these people “would likely be ineligible under a UK assisted dying law requiring a six-month prognosis”.
The longer the debate has gone on regarding Leadbeater’s Bill, the more threadbare the arguments for the Bill. From recycling misleading polling that only looks at the principle of assisted suicide and not the details of the actual Bill, to an increasing reliance on Esther Rantzen rounding on critics of the Bill, I sympathise with the situation that the Leadbeater camp finds itself in. Out of desperation, we’ve had this latest attempt to fabricate or imply an issue that doesn’t exist. There is no stampede of Brits heading to Dignitias. The reality is that it is barely a trickle and one that hasn’t even marginally increased in strength over the past decade.
No alarmism around the propensity of Brits who want to travel to Dignitas will change the facts. This is just another sordid tactic from an increasingly desperate campaign.
