Retired minister and multiple sclerosis sufferer Campbell Wilson is convinced there should be no change in the assisted suicide laws despite the landmark victory by fellow MS patient Debbie Purdy from Bradford.

Mr Wilson (66) — whose condition has gradually worsened since it was diagnosed 36 years ago — is confined to a wheelchair, is no longer able to write, is blind in one eye, can’t concentrate to read for any length of time and suffers loss of memory.

He was told recently he could live for another 20 years. “To be honest, I enjoy life so much that I hope the predictions are right,” he said from his home near Garvagh in Co Londonderry. “I have a wonderful wife, three sons and a daughter who are loving and caring, and three grandchildren I adore. I have no thoughts of ending it all. I don’t suppose you can preach about the power of acceptance all your life and then buckle when things get tough.”

He added: “Debbie Purdy is calling for a law in Britain to clarify the position of people who assist the suicide of a loved one with a view to non-prosecution. But that carries real dangers for the sick and the elderly. It puts them in an intolerable position to end it all. It makes them very vulnerable — that they are a burden to society and it’s time to go.

“That would breed an attitude in society that would devalue the lives of the aged and disabled. We wouldn’t want that.”

Mr Wilson, though, conceded that assisted suicide is an issue with deep grey areas. “You can’t put yourself in the position of someone suffering constant, excruciating pain and who wants the final comfort that death would bring.

“I have to say there must be a practical loophole. It would indeed be a ruthless country that would prosecute a compassionate, caring relative travelling to Switzerland to help put a terminally ill person out of constant, terrible pain. The current attitude of turning a blind eye and not prosecuting is the right one. But to make it easy and allow wholesale suicide in Britain would be to place a death sentence on many elderly and the terminally ill people not in a position to make their own rational decision.”

Mr Wilson doesn’t pretend that he finds life easy — he is unable to dress himself in the mornings and has the support of social services in that respect. He finds it “humiliating” that he can’t do everyday things like going to the toilet unaided.

MS was diagnosed when he was 30, but he managed to sustain “a wonderful working life” as a Presbyterian minister — in Belfast, Banbridge and Portadown — until he was 62, and then retired to his home area of Garvagh.

He is still able to garden, to act as a supply minister during holidays, pulpit vacancies and to conduct funerals and weddings — and to drive his racy VW Eos convertible.

“The flowers and vegetables are superb this year,” he said with pride. “But without the support of my angel of a wife Louise and the family — not to mention the NHS — life would be extremely difficult.”