A COVENTRY MP is delighted after his bill for an opt-out organ donation system that will ‘save hundreds of lives’ every year became law.
The opt-out system will mean UK citizens will be assumed to be organ donors until they or family members say otherwise.
The Coventry North West Labour MP Geoffrey Robinson spearheaded the campaign to win government support and parliamentary backing.
The bill received royal assent and became recognised as Max and Keira’s Law after a private members’ bill on Friday (March 15).
Mr Robinson said: “In passing last Friday it gave us a little chink of light in a dark week for British politics and shows what we can still achieve as a Parliament even in such a time of division.
“What the act does is shift consent in favour of presumption while maintaining an effective role for families and the ability for anyone to opt out.
“This will ensure their loved one’s wishes are truly honoured and many lives can be saved in the process.”
Government figures have in the past suggested around 700 lives would be saved every year if the bill was enacted.
And around 5,100 people in England were waiting for a transplant at the end of March last year.
Mr Robinson says over 100 MPs were in the House of Commons on February 23 for the bill’s second reading, showing the strength of support for the bill.
A spokesperson from Mr Robinson’s office said: “The hope is that it will drive cultural change in England as it has done in Wales.
“Soft opt-out systems thrive in Europe: Spain and Belgium, which changed to opt-out in the 1980s, have the highest consent rates in Europe.
“Most countries in Europe now operate under this model, and no nation which has shifted to an opt-out system has yet reversed the change.”
Wales already has an opt-out system introduced in 2015.
His team has indicated the provisional cost of introducing the scheme over four years would be around £18million.
The law is named after Max Johnson, aged 10, whose life was saved by nine-year-old donor Keira Ball.
