Terminally ill man calls for change to assisted dying law before ending his life at Dignitas

Bob Cole will commit suicide at the Swiss clinic at 2.00pm today

Dignitas, where Bob Cole watched his wife Ann Hall die around 18 months ago (Getty Images)

A terminally ill man has called for a change to the UK law on assisted dying as he prepared to end his life at a Swiss clinic.

Bob Cole, 68, will commit suicide at 2pm at the Dignitas euthanasia unit around 18 months after watching his wife Ann Hall do the same.

Mr Cole, who suffers an aggressive form of lung cancer called mesothelioma, said he was "taking a stand" and urged politicians to review the law, which makes it illegal for others to encourage or assist someone trying to take their own life.

Bob Cole on the front page of The Sun newspaper (The Sun/PA) (PA)

He told The Sun: "I should be able to die with dignity in my own country, in my own bed. The law needs to change. How do you change the law? People have got to take a stand. So that's what I'm doing today.

"I saw Ann die and a year later to be faced with the same decision yourself is quite the double whammy. I had just started to pick myself up when I fell ill."

According to the paper, the former carpenter from Chester spent £12,000 on the trip.

Mr Cole said his cancer had seen him bent double, "crouching like an animal", adding: "That's no life."

In asking MPs to be "sympathetic", he told the paper: "The politicians need to have the guts to change this law. Just bite the bullet. Accept that the British public want this change. If they don't it will be forced upon them because the public feeling is overwhelming."

His wife, Ann, 67, who suffered from progressive supranuclear palsy, chose to die in February last year, in a process Mr Cole called "graceful".

Press Association