The brother of a British woman who died at Dignitas has appealed for choice on the two-year anniversary of her death.
Before Paola Marra’s death aged 53, she left a message urging politicians to change the “cruel law” in the UK when it comes to assisted dying.
The former charity sector and music industry worker, who had once been married to Blur drummer Dave Rowntree, teamed up with renowned photographer Rankin before her death to share her message on assisted dying.
She passed away at the Swiss clinic on March 20 2024, having fought breast and bowel cancer.
Her brother Tony Marra said she had been “failed” by the current law in England, and left with “no choice” but to travel alone to her death abroad.
In a film released just a day after she died, she said: “Assisted dying is not about giving up. In fact, it’s about reclaiming control. It’s not about death, it’s about dignity.
“It’s about giving people the right to end their suffering on their own terms, with compassion and respect.
“So, as you watch this, I am dead. But you watching this could help change the laws around assisted dying.”
Two years on, Mr Marra is set to join campaigners outside Parliament as the proposed law for England and Wales to legalise assisted dying continues to be debated in the House of Lords.
The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, which passed the Commons last year, has been the subject of days of debate in the upper chamber, and appears at risk of running out of time to become law.
It will fail if it does not complete all its parliamentary stages before the end of the current session in May.
Supporters of the Bill have accused some peers of time-wasting and attempts to talk it out, while opponents insist they are simply doing their job of scrutinising legislation they argue is not safe in its current form and needs to be strengthened.
An attempt to change the law in Scotland failed earlier this week when MSPs at Holyrood voted down the Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill.
Ahead of a further day of debate in the Lords on the Westminster Bill on Friday, Mr Marra said: “Two years ago, my sister Paola, terminally ill with bowel cancer, died alone in Switzerland.
“England – the place she had called home for so long – had given her no choice. She wasn’t asking for anything extraordinary; she was asking for the right to die with dignity, in her own country, surrounded by the people she loved.
“The law failed her, and she had to travel hundreds of miles, all alone, to do what should have been possible here.”
He urged peers not to delay the Bill but instead to “let us choose” so as to prevent more families sharing the experience he and his loved ones have endured.
He said: “MPs in this country have listened and voted to back an assisted dying law. But now a small group of Lords are delaying the Bill, as real people run out of time.
“My message to Parliament is this: don’t let another family experience what mine did. Every day that law change is delayed has a human cost. Please, let us choose.”
Two Crown Dependencies, which are part of the British Isles but separate to the UK, have legislated for assisted dying.
In February, Jersey passed its draft assisted dying law and the legislation is awaiting royal assent so it can formally become law on the island.
The move follows the passage of legislation in the Isle of Man, where the Tynwald became the first parliament in the British Isles to agree a framework for assisted dying in March 2025.
But opponents of assisted dying hailed the defeat of the Scottish Bill as a “great victory for the most vulnerable in our society” and there have been calls for a focus instead on improvements to end-of-life care.
Former prime minister Gordon Brown has said there is a “moral obligation” to make “urgently needed improvements” to such care across the UK and has called on the governments in the four nations to co-operate in a bid to ensure dying people can be “guaranteed the most compassionate and highest quality of care” regardless of where they live.
He complained there is a currently a “postcode lottery” in the UK, which means not everyone who needs it can benefit from “high levels of care” as they approach the end of their life.
