READ MORE:Silent Witness actress Liz Carr has claimed that 'as long as there's inequality, it is not safe to legalise' assisted suicide in the UK - after revealing how disabled people are told 'surely it's better to be dead than be you?'.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Woman’s Hour on Thursday, she claimed 'as long as there's inequality, it is not safe to legalise' assisted suicide, adding: 'No amount of safeguards will prevent us from mistakes and abuse and coercion, that's my belief.' 'You know, we do suffer. So don't then make it legal to end that suffering through assisted suicide, that's the fear.'
'So that difference shows me that oftentimes I think disabled people are just tolerated and I think that's the same with ill people and older people, and I think all those groups would be affected by these laws. The 52-year-old actress is known for playing forensic examiner Clarissa Mullery in BBC crime drama Silent Witness.
She said: 'I thought I was going to die as a teenager. I thought I was going to die as a 20-year-old. 'Before the course I'd think, I can't get on the bus because I can't walk and that's my problem. They said, what if the buses were all accessible? She explained how her mother recently found a diary entry which detailed how her younger self 'wanted to die' when she was aged 12.
The issue of assisted dying is never far from the news. In recent months, it has been put in the spotlight by a series of high profile cases in The Netherlands. In the UK, meanwhile, Dame Esther Rantzen led a chorus of dismay after a report by MPs into assisted dying failed to deliver any clear-cut findings or proposals in February.
It instead recommended that the Government should consider how to respond if moves are made to bring assisted dying into law in parts of the UK.