Clause 24 - Advance decisions to refuse treatment: general
Mental Capacity Bill
10:00 am
Mr Tim Boswell (Shadow Minister, Home Affairs; Daventry, Conservative)
I am following the hon. Lady's argument with interest and, as ever, with some sympathy because of the intensity of feeling that she and others have about this matter. Does she agree that currently advance directives are legally binding? The issue is not whether they exist—she may beg to differ—but the conditions under which their existence is established, and the safeguards that prevent, for example, subsequent self-reference by a doctor who says, ''That's what the patient told me,'' without any other supporting evidence.