THE widow of Simon Binner said a BBC documentary showing her husband killing himself in a Swiss Clinic is “beautiful” — but insists it does not promote euthanasia.

    Debbie Binner was with her husband, 57, who had motor neurone disease, when he was filmed administering a deadly dose of anaesthetic 600 miles from home in Purley, Surrey last year.

    The BBC has been accused of marketing euthanasia by showing “How to Die: Simon’s Choice” on Wednesday night, but Mrs. Binner has praised the documentary and hopes it sparks a “grown-up debate.”

    When asked whether she accepted criticism of her husband’s decision to film his death, which he had previously announced on LinkedIn, she said: “It’s not a black and white issue.”

    In the film Simon Binner is seen on a bed in a drab, nondescript room, dressed in a blue and pink checked shirt and grey trousers.

    Around his bed stand loved ones, their eyes ringed red and their heads bowed in sadness, and his wife crying softly, holds his right hand.

    Slowly but surely, with shaking fingers, he opens a small yellow valve on a tube that is attached via a needle to his left arm. He lies back on the bed, breathes heavily and shuts his eyes for the last time.

    Four minutes later, Mr. Binner, a brilliant businessman with a loving wife and family, was dead, killed by a lethal dose of anaesthetic which he administered in a Swiss suicide clinic.

    His precious final moments on the morning of Oct. 19 last year, were shared only with those he cared for the most in the world: his wife, Debbie, sister Elizabeth and three of his closest friends.

    Simon was so ashamed of what motor neurone disease — the debilitating condition with which he had been diagnosed in January — had done to him that he wouldn’t even let his mother, Jean, or his stepdaughters, Hannah and Zoe, be present.

    The controversial documentary follows Simon and his family for the 10 months preceding his suicide in Basel, Switzerland.

    Critics say the decision to screen the moment of Simon’s death is particularly alarming, as it risks encouraging others to take their own lives by “normalizing” assisted suicide, which remains illegal under U.K. law.

    Alistair Thompson, spokesman for Care Not Killing, a campaign group that promotes end-of-life care and opposes assisted suicide, describes the documentary as “deeply disturbing.”

    “We should do everything we can to stop suicide, not advertise it,” he said.

    The BBC has denied it is promoting euthanasia and a spokesman said: “This is a sensitive observational documentary following one family’s experience of assisted death, which explores some of the complex questions at the heart of this deeply divisive issue. The film does not serve to support either argument or intend to wholly represent the debate.”

    (SD-Agencies)