Government adviser says changing law would challenge long-held consensus of trying to prevent all suicides.

The government’s suicide prevention adviser has said that legalising assisted dying in England and Wales may cause major issues in suicide prevention work if the state effectively concedes that taking one’s own life should be allowed in some circumstances.

Prof Louis Appleby, who chairs the government’s national suicide prevention strategy advisory group, also said he took issue with MPs who said it was offensive to call assisted dying “suicide” – saying that it was wrong to bar the use of that phrase in this context.