MPs debate assisted dying before crunch parliament vote

Legalisation could move a step closer for England and Wales depending on the result on Friday.
The outcome will lead to the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill either clearing the House of Commons and moving to the Lords, or falling completely – with a warning the latter could mean the issue might not return to Westminster for a decade.
Bill sponsor Kim Leadbeater (Jonathan Brady/PA)
Opening her debate, Bill sponsor Kim Leadbeater, said her proposed legislation is 'cogent' and 'workable', with 'one simple thread running through it – the need to correct the profound injustices of the status quo and to offer a compassionate and safe choice to terminally ill people who want to make it'.
She shared emotional stories from people she had met throughout the campaign to legalise assisted dying, both bereaved and terminally ill.
Pressed by Conservative former minister Simon Hoare on concerns raised about the Bill by some doctors and medical bodies including the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Ms Leadbeater said: 'We have different views in this House and different people in different professions have different views.'
She noted that all the royal colleges have a neutral position on assisted dying.
The relatively narrow majority of 55 from the historic yes vote in November means every vote will count on Friday.
The Bill would fall if 28 MPs switched directly from voting yes to no, but only if all other MPs voted the same way as in November, including those who abstained.
Supporters and opponents of a change in the law gathered at Westminster early on Friday, holding placards saying 'Let us choose' and 'Don't make doctors killers'.
On the eve of the vote, in what will be seen as a blow to the Bill, four Labour MPs confirmed they will switch sides to oppose the proposed new law.
Paul Foster, Jonathan Hinder, Markus Campbell-Savours and Kanishka Narayan wrote to fellow MPs to voice concerns about the safety of the proposed legislation.
They branded it 'drastically weakened', citing the scrapping of the High Court judge safeguard as a key reason.
Kemi Badenoch (Lucy North/PA)
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch urged her MPs to vote against the legislation, describing it as 'a bad Bill' despite being 'previously supportive of assisted suicide'.
As it stands, the proposed legislation would allow terminally ill adults in England and Wales with fewer than six months to live to apply for an assisted death, subject to approval by two doctors and a panel featuring a social worker, senior legal figure and psychiatrist.
Ms Leadbeater has insisted the replacement of High Court judge approval with multidisciplinary panels is a strengthening of the legislation, incorporating wider expert knowledge to assess assisted dying applications.
Before confirmation of the four vote-switchers, Ms Leadbeater acknowledged she expected 'some small movement in the middle' but that she did not 'anticipate that that majority would be heavily eroded'.
She insisted her Bill is 'the most robust piece of legislation in the world' and has argued that dying people must be given choice at the end of their lives in a conversation which has seen support from high-profile figures including Dame Esther Rantzen.
Dame Esther Rantzen's daughter Rebecca Wilcox outside Parliament (Yui Mok/PA)
MPs have a free vote on the Bill, meaning they decide according to their conscience rather than along party lines.
There is no obligation on MPs to take part in the vote, and others present on Friday could formally abstain.
Ms Leadbeater warned that choosing not to support the assisted dying Bill is 'not a neutral act', but rather 'a vote for the status quo'.
She said: 'It fills me with despair to think MPs could be here in another 10 years' time hearing the same stories.'
All eyes will be on whether Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and senior colleagues continue their support for the Bill.
Sir Keir indicated earlier this week that he had not changed his mind since voting yes last year, saying his 'position is long-standing and well-known'.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting described Ms Leadbeater's work on the proposed legislation as 'extremely helpful', but confirmed in April that he still intended to vote against it.
Wes Streeting (Ben Whitley/PA)
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has voiced her continued backing of the Bill, saying she she hopes it can clear the Commons and continue its progress to becoming law.
She told Sky News she has a 'long-standing personal commitment to change the law on assisted dying with appropriate safeguards' and praised the 'very considered and respectful debate over the last few months on all sides'.
A vote must be called before 2.30pm, as per parliamentary procedure.
Friday's session began with considerations of outstanding amendments to the Bill, including one to prevent a person meeting the requirements for an assisted death 'solely as a result of voluntarily stopping eating or drinking'.
The amendment – accepted without the need for a vote – combined with existing safeguards in the Bill, would rule out people with eating disorders falling into its scope, Ms Leadbeater has said.
Another amendment, requiring ministers to report within a year of the Bill passing on how assisted dying could affect palliative care, was also approved by MPs.
Marie Curie welcomed the amendment, but warned that 'this will not on its own make the improvements needed to guarantee everyone is able to access the palliative care they need' and urged a palliative care strategy for England 'supported by a sustainable funding settlement – which puts palliative and end of life care at the heart of NHS priorities for the coming years'.
Ms Leadbeater has warned it could be a decade before legislation returns to Parliament if MPs reject her Bill on Friday.
A YouGov poll of 2,003 adults in Great Britain, surveyed last month and published on Thursday, suggested public support for the Bill remains at 73% – unchanged from November.
The proportion of people who feel assisted dying should be legal in principle has risen slightly, to 75% from 73% in November.

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Learn with AIFact CheckingText to SpeechAI Summary

Related Articles

Spectator

22 minutes ago

• Spectator

They will say this was ‘parliament at its best'. And they will be lying

The portents this morning were grim. The Grim Leadreaper was doing her HR manager of Hades act, buzzing around with faux sincerity like a wasp that had discovered LGBT History Month. Jess Philips took a great huff on her vape in the lobby before walking into the chamber. Perhaps it was sulphur flavour. Inside the House of Commons the obviously sham last-minute 'switcher' Jack Abbott from the bill committee, as spineless a backbench toady as you ever did see, was there being all chummy with the unparalleled toad Jake Richards. Were they bonding perhaps over their new-found enthusiasm for death? It was Brokeback Mountain meets The Zone of Interest. Voting began on amendments. A glut of ambitious backbench MPs rejected a safeguard brought forward by a coalition of MPs as diverse as Dame Karen Bradley for the Tories, Jim Allister for the TUV and brave and doughty Labour MPs Rachel Maskell and Jonathan Davies. It was designed to stop people from killing themselves because they felt like a burden. Then Leadbeater herself spoke. 'It's not often that we get to debate morality issues in parliament', she said; just three days after parliament voted to decriminalise abortion up to birth via a sneakily tacked-on amendment and a few minutes of debate. The Leisure Centre operative turned supreme arbiter of life and death likes to talk about how she and her bill represent 'parliament at its best'. The irony being that anyone who truly believes this would fail any reasonable capacity test. The concerns of the key royal colleges of experts, who'd made repeated interventions in opposition to the bill, were shrugged off as 'different views'. Wera Hobhouse, the Lib Dem MP for Bath complained that some members of the public had suggested that the current crop of MPs were too stupid to discuss an issue of this magnitude. For all their faults sometimes the General Public really do hit the nail on the head. Not only were many demonstrably too stupid to engage properly, some of them couldn't even be bothered to stay awake. Wearing a pair of dark glasses, Lib Dem MP Tessa Munt openly dozed through several speeches. Certain moments added to the general atmosphere of despair. Jake Richards rolled his eyes and performatively scoffed as Naz Shah explained the bill's failure to close the anorexia loophole. Labour MP Lewis Atkinson commended the work of the hospice movement in alleviating suffering at the end of life. His praise was treacly, sweet and insincere. Almost diabetes-inducing in its efforts – another disease which will no doubt qualify for state sanctioned death in due time. While scrutinising the bill on the committee, the same Lewis Atkinson also rejected conscience amendments that would have prevented hospices and care homes from being forced to provide assisted dying The walking embodiment of the banality of evil, Lib Dem MP Luke Taylor said that voting in favour was a good way to 'bookend the week'. That's the level of import MPs gave to this issue of life and death: bump off the weak to bookend your week. Many impassioned MPs never got to speak at all; Rosie Duffield left the chamber in disgust after trying to catch the Deputy Speaker's eye for several hours, with no success. There was some debate about whether the Prime Minister – a long term death enthusiast – would turn up to vote. In the end, he did. It was nice of Esther Rantzen to send her own personal proxy. Bump off the weak to bookend your week It's worth naming those Labour MPs who have gone above and beyond in their attempts to make their colleagues see sense. Those, like Rachael Maskell, who worked behind the scenes to try and put down amendments that would safeguard the vulnerable. Jess Asato, who made probably the best and most forensic speech of the debate. Diane Abbott who, despite obvious illness, rose to speak movingly about the risks of compulsion. And Adam Jogee, who left a dying relative's bedside to come and vote because the bill's 'compassionate' proposer refused to find him a supporter to pair with and so spend the last moments he had with a loved one. Do remember them: they have been principled exceptions to the otherwise disgraceful rule. Given we are now a culture which embraces and promotes death, perhaps a post-script on political deaths. When the inevitable national inquiry delves into the abuse and shortcomings of this law – which it will – the Labour backbenchers and Tory grandees who made this possible, these back-slapping middle-management Molochs will have their names etched in history as the people who brought this about. They will achieve a sort of immortality; just not as the progressive liberators they vainly imagine themselves to be. Secondly, while much has been written about the impending death of the Tory party, what seems to have gone unnoticed is the death of Labour as well. What once made claims to be the party of working people, a force in politics on the side of the needy and the vulnerable, has in just under a year become a death cult for comfortable progressives. The tragedy is that they will drag down the very people they purport to protect with them.

BBC News

25 minutes ago

• BBC News

Assisted dying: How did my MP vote on Friday 20 June?

MPs have voted to legalise assisted dying in England and Wales after their final debate on the change in the months of deliberation and scrutiny, the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was backed by 314 votes to 291, a majority of were given a free vote on the issue, meaning parties did not instruct them what to third reading of the bill was the last opportunity for MPs to approve or reject it. The majority in favour has more than halved since MPs first backed proposals to legalise assisted dying in England and November they supported it by 330 to 275, a majority of to that, it had been almost a decade since the House of Commons had voted on the issue, deciding in 2015 to reject the "right to die" bill now passes to the House of Lords for further scrutiny. The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was introduced by Labour MP Kim proposed letting terminally ill people end their life if they:are over 18, live in England or Wales, and have been registered with a GP for at least 12 monthshave the mental capacity to make the choice and be deemed to have expressed a clear, settled and informed wish, free from coercion or pressurebe expected to die within six monthsmake two separate declarations, witnessed and signed, about their wish to diesatisfy two independent doctors that they are eligible - with at least seven days between each assessment MPs make case for and against assisted dying bill, as campaigners waitHow could assisted dying laws change? The bill has since been amended following the committee and report stages, where it was scrutinised line by line by key changes included dropping the requirement for a High Court judge to approve assisted dying applications, replacing it with a three-person panel featuring a senior legal figure, psychiatrist and social changes explicitly prevent doctors from discussing assisted dying without other options, such as palliative care, psychological support or symptom management. The amended bill also says independent advocates should be provided for people who have learning disabilities, autism or mental health conditions.A separate bill on assisted dying is being considered in Scotland and passed an initial vote at Holyrood in May 2025 but is subject to further debate and changes before a final March, the Isle of Man was the first part of the British Isles to approve assisted it remains illegal in most countries, more than 300 million people now live in countries which have legalised assisted Australia, New Zealand, Spain and Austria have all introduced assisted dying laws since 2015.

The Independent

26 minutes ago

• The Independent

James Cleverly emotional as he tells MPs of best friend's death

James Cleverly spoke in the House of Commons on Friday during the debate on the assisted dying bill. He revealed that his closest friend recently passed away "painfully" from esophageal cancer, after Mr Cleverly spent the final weeks of his life with him. Mr Cleverly, a leading opponent of the Bill, stated his concerns are practical and not based on faith or ignorance. He expressed a desire to alleviate suffering but said the Bill, which was voted through with a narrow margin, was not a good enough piece of legislation to pass. Watch the video in full above.