Keir Starmer, the director of public prosecutions, seems to be making law on his own in setting out new guidelines on assisted suicide this morning. Dominic Grieve, the Tory shadow justice secretary, promptly says it's difficult subject – but that it "must remain for parliament to decide the right balance in the law".
Quite right, too. But Grieve, who is also a proper lawyer who thoroughly checks the immigration status of all his employees, must also know why Starmer did what he did. Because parliament refuses to decide the right balance.
How do we know? Because a Labour peer called Joel Joffe, also a serious lawyer (he represented Nelson Mandela at the 1963-4 Rivonia trial), has been trying for years to amend the law – and been beaten back by the usual suspects in the upper house.
There's a long history to this. As recently as June, Lord (Charlie) Falconer, the Blairista ex-lord chancellor, tried to amend the coroners and justice bill and was seen off by 194 votes to 141, as this partisan account confirms.
Peers have a right to vote as they do. Remember Lady Campbell's brilliant speech in support of the majority view from her wheelchair – a woman who says she has been "encouraged" towards suicide more than once in a lifetime of struggle.
But everyone knows the law is unclear. It may discourage the wicked who want to get their hands on granny's flat. But it also gives needless anxiety to decent people who wish their loved ones nothing more than an end to what they have come to see as pointless pain which burdens themselves and others.
Jack Straw, the current justice secretary, is against easing the law. He can spot trouble and a deeply divisive issue. Starmer's statement of clarification, issued at the behest of the law lords in the summer, does not change the law (Grieve confirms the point); it seeks to clarify it.
If the Tories win the election – I think we must assume they will, despite Gordon's medal for statesmanship in New York overnight – they will not change the law. In both Lords and Commons the forces of social conservatism, led by the Catholic church, will see to that.
So good for Keir Starmer, I'd say. He's done the best he can in difficult circumstances. The lawyers aren't always right, nor the politicians wrong. But they are this time: permanent dither is not the right solution.
