'My brother died distraught, desolate and in despair - now MPs must back assisted dying'

'My brother died distraught, desolate and in despair - now MPs must back assisted dying' EXCLUSIVE: Former police officer Jane Brown is speaking out for the first time as MPs prepare to take part in a 'make-or-break' vote on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill A former police officer is urging MPs to back assisted dying after her brother died “distraught and in despair.” Jane Brown, 63, says the excellent care her brother Colin received could not prevent the suffering and loss of control he experienced before his death from cancer. Now, days before MPs vote on assisted dying, she is asking them to give other terminally ill people the choice he did not have. Jane from Maidstone was by the side of her 65-year-old brother Colin Mutimer, in the weeks before he died from cancer on June 24th 2025. Jane believes her older brother's experience also shows why improving palliative and end-of-life care, while vital, cannot be a reason to delay assisted dying. Colin had access to specialist care which he and Jane valued enormously, but there remained suffering that medicine could not undo. She said: "Colin wanted the choice to decide when he had had enough. He should have had that choice.” Having spent decades in the police, Jane was no stranger to difficult situations and death, but watching someone she loved become increasingly distressed and lose his independence as his illness progressed has had a profound effect on her. She is speaking publicly ahead of the assisted dying vote in Parliament on Friday 11 September because she believes terminally ill people should have a choice over how and when they die. The private members bill proposes allowing mentally competent adults with a terminal illness and six months or less to live to request an assisted death, subject to strict medical and independent panel approvals. Earlier this year it went to the House of Lords after being passed by MPs. But a small handful of Peers made 1,000 plus amendments to it, making it run out of time. This Friday it is going back to the Commons for a second time. Opponents of the plan have warned that legalising assisted dying could put pressure on vulnerable people to end their lives prematurely. Kerry Hogan, Campaign Communications Manager at My Death, My Decision, said: “Friday's vote is make-or-break. If this Bill is voted down in the Commons, it is gone, and reform could be pushed back for years, potentially a decade. If it gets through, there is a very real chance assisted dying will finally become law. “The House of Commons has already backed this legislation once. Now MPs need to show up, vote and finish the job they started. If this fails because supportive MPs stay away, dying people and families like Jane’s will be left paying the price.” Jane says her brother Colin was fiercely independent, sociable and creative, playing percussion in a band for 40 years. He loved to tap dance, had published a book of poetry and transformed a derelict allotment into a place where friends would gather. As late as January 2025, just five months before his death, he was still swimming with Jane and could swim 25 metres underwater. But Colin had lived with cancer for many years after being diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 2000. Eighteen years later he had a cancerous kidney removed but then the cancer began to spread. In 2023, after extensive research and conversations with specialists, he decided against immunotherapy because of the impact it would have on his quality of life. Jane said: “Colin’s decision not to have further treatment had given him much angst. It was not, and I stress not, a decision taken lightly. "I remember him asking, ‘Will it make me stronger than I am today?’ The answer was 'no, just longer'. He always maintained to me that he wanted quality over longevity and I always told him I would support whatever he decided.” By March 2025 Colin was experiencing severe pain and was admitted to the Royal Marsden, where Jane says he received exemplary care and remained extremely grateful to those treating him. But his cancer had spread aggressively. On May 12th he was told he had less than six months to live and three days later, that prognosis was revised to weeks. Then on May 18th his arm broke because of cancer in his bones and nothing could be done to repair it. By then Colin could no longer feed himself, walk, go to the toilet independently or use his phone. A man who had always been intensely sociable stopped seeing almost everyone apart from Jane, her husband and one close friend. “He was so distraught,” Jane said. “He was in despair. Once he was told he’d only got a few weeks to live he refused all visitors and family. Only me and my husband went to see him. It could have been so different. “He shut down everything, even the cards had to be put away and the radio turned off because he was so distraught.” His final days were marked by "agitation, fear and anxiety" and constant discomfort. Jane stayed with him, sometimes able to do little more than hold his hand. At one point Colin told her: “I’m in despair. I want the day to come.” Jane asked whether he meant the day he would die. He said ‘yes’. A few weeks before his death, Jane told Colin she was going to a demonstration outside Parliament in support of assisted dying. By then he was unable to speak, but gave her a thumbs up. Jane believes her brother would have wanted the option of an assisted death in his final days. “He just wanted to live life while he could. I miss our daily chats about life and I just miss my big, clever, quirky brother every day. He had strength, tenacity and resilience in abundance. It is so, so sad that it had to end the way it did." Dave Sowry, Chair of My Death, My Decision, said: “Jane should not have to relive the worst weeks of her brother’s life and campaign for change. She should be allowed to grieve him. “Colin knew what mattered to him. He had thought deeply about the choices he faced, he received excellent care, and still he ended his life frightened, in pain and asking for the end to come. “It is deeply frustrating that families are still being put through this. MPs have the power to change that. Next week, they need to use it.”