Rishi Sunak has said he is not opposed to assisted dying in principle ahead of an expected vote on the issue in the next parliament.
Speaking to journalists in Puglia, the prime minister said he was not against changing the law on euthanasia.
There is likely to be a Commons vote on the issue in the next five years; Keir Starmer, the Labour leader whose party is 20 points ahead in the polls, has committed to setting aside time for one and said he supports a change.
Asked whether he supported changing the law on assisted dying, Sunak said: “I’m not against it in principle. It’s just a question of having the safeguards in place and that’s where people have had questions in the past.”
The Conservative leader said his party’s manifesto specified assisted dying was a matter of conscience and committed to implementing parliament’s will.
Starmer’s pledge does not appear in his party’s manifesto.
The issue was brought to the fore by Esther Rantzen, the broadcaster and founder of Childline, who has stage 4 lung cancer and has said she will consider going to Switzerland, where assisted dying is legal, if it does not work.
Speaking to Rantzen in a call recorded by ITV News, Starmer said earlier this year: “I’m personally in favour of changing the law. I think we need to make time. We will make the commitment. Esther, I can give you that commitment right now.”
Starmer added: “For people who are going through this or are likely to go through it in the next few months or years, this matters hugely and delay just prolongs the agony.”
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Assisted dying is banned in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, with a maximum prison sentence of 14 years. While there is no specific offence of assisted suicide in Scotland, euthanasia is illegal and can be prosecuted as murder or culpable homicide.
A bill to legalise assisted dying in the UK was defeated by 330 to 118 in 2015, but was backed by Starmer and several Conservative cabinet members.
Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, also voted in favour of the 2015 bill and has said he is open to changing the law. Speaking to Times Radio this year, he said: “I sort of lean towards it, but I think I’d need reassurance that no one would feel coerced into ending their life sooner, that no doctor would be coerced or forced to take part in ending someone’s life in that way.”
