Encouraging or assisting suicide

Guidance on new law in force in February

Official guidance, which can be found here on this site, has been issued on the implementation of s.59 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 – coming into force on 1st February 2010.  Section 59 of the 2009 Act simplifies the law by replacing the previous two offences, of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring suicide and of attempting to do so, with a single offence. It covers behaviour that was previously caught by both section 2 of the Suicide Act 1961 and the offence of attempting to commit a section 2 offence under the Criminal Attempts Act 1981.  In line with the Law Commission’s recommendation, section 59 also replaces the old-fashioned language of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring with the more modern - and equivalent - terms of encouraging or assisting which should make it easier for people to understand the sort of behaviour that the law prohibits.

Date Added: 31st January 2010