MPs vote to LEGALISE assisted dying

Assisted dying is set to become legal after MPs backed the biggest change to suicide law in decades despite warnings people will die unnecessarily. 

Medics will be allowed to help the terminally ill end their own lives after a bitterly contested vote in the Commons this afternoon.

MPs voted by 314 to 291 – a majority of 23 – to approve Kim Leadbeater’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill despite warnings that it was rushed through and could negatively affect the disabled, domestic abuse victims and people with anorexia. 

Under the legislation terminally ill people in England and Wales diagnosed with less than six months to live will be allowed to seek medical help to die.

It is expected that the process will launch by the end of the decade, with estimates suggesting as many as 4,000 people will use it annually within 10 years.

Campaigner Dame Esther Rantzen hailed the vote result as one which will make a ‘huge positive difference’ and protect terminally ill people from a ‘bad death’.

MPs made impassioned pleas for and against it becoming law. They had a free vote on a ‘conscience matter’, with most of the parties split between the yes and no camps. 

The majority in support of change was 55 in a preliminary vote in November. Some MPs appeared visibly emotional as they left the chamber.

Among those who voted for the law change were PM Sir Keir Starmer and his Tory predecessor, Rishi Sunak. 

Deputy PM Angela Rayner and Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who will now have to work on bringing in the law change if it gets royal assent, both voted against it, as did current Tory leader Kemi Badenoch.

The legislation allows 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.   

The bill will now move to the Lords, with opponents vowing to fight it in the upper chamber.

Right to Life spokeswoman Catherine Robinson said: ‘The Bill still faces an uphill battle to reach Royal Assent.’

And Dr Gordon Macdonald, chief executive of Care Not Killing, said MPs had passed a ‘deeply flawed and dangerous’ bill.

‘The current Bill fails to protect vulnerable and disabled people from coercion,’ he said.

‘This is not hyperbolae but based on what happens in the US state of Oregon, the model for this law. 

‘There, a majority of those who have ended their lives in recent years cite fear of being a burden on their families, carers or finances as a reason.’

There was silence in the chamber as the result was returned this afternoon after a day of debate and impassioned arguments.

The vote came as supporters and opponents of the law change gathered outside Parliament to press the case, including Bake Off host Prue Leith. 

Supporters wept, jumped and hugged each other as the news came through that it had been passed by MPs.

The crowd of around 100 people in Parliament Square, Westminster, erupted into cheers on Friday afternoon as the news was livestreamed over a speaker by campaigners from Dignity In Dying.

One supporter said: ‘Yes, dad’ and others patted each other on the shoulder.

Mother of the House Diane Abbott had earlier asked MPs to vote against the bill, saying: ‘There is no doubt that if this Bill is passed in its current form, people will lose their lives who do not need to, and they will be amongst the most vulnerable and marginalised in our society.’

And former Tory minister Sir James Cleverly answered yes camp claims that the law might not change for a decade if it is not done now, as he argued there will be ‘plenty of opportunities’ in future. 

Many critics on both sides have asked for the legislation to be postponed to allow more scrutiny and changes to it to be made. 

Labour MP Naz Shah warned anorexia patients could still access assisted dying through a ‘loophole’. The Bradford MP cautioned that the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was ‘not safe’. 

Shadow frontbencher Robert Jenrick also reiterated his opposition last night.

Writing for the Daily Mail, he reveals how he helped look after his grandmother, Dorothy, as a teenage boy – and how she continued to bring joy to the family as she defied a terminal diagnosis for nearly a decade. 

The shadow justice secretary says the prospect of legalising assisted dying ‘fills me with dread’, adding: ‘My Nana felt like she was a burden. I know how much she hated the indignity she felt at having to ask my Mum or us to help her with basic needs.

‘People like her – and there are many such people – may consider an assisted death as another act of kindness to us. How wrong they would be.’

 Ms Leadbeater has argued terminally ill people must be given choice at the end of their lives, but opponents of her Bill have warned it fails to guarantee protections for society’s most vulnerable.

So close is the vote that Alliance MP Sorcha Eastwood, who was isolating with Covid, was offered a private ambulance to bring her to the Commons to vote against it. However she tested negative today and plans to make her own way in. 

Four Labour MPs confirmed on the eve of the vote that they would switch sides to oppose the proposed new law.

Labour’s Paul Foster, Jonathan Hinder, Markus Campbell-Savours and Kanishka Narayan voiced concerns about the safety of the ‘drastically weakened’ legislation, citing the scrapping of the High Court Judge safeguard as a key reason.

Liverpool MP Dan Carden – the leader of the Blue Labour group – also said he would vote against the Bill having previously abstained.

‘I genuinely fear the legislation will take us in the wrong direction,’ he told the Guardian last night. 

‘The values of family, social bonds, responsibilities, time and community will be diminished, with isolation, atomisation and individualism winning again.’

It comes as Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Westminster and most senior Catholic in the UK, said the Church will close Catholic hospices and care homes if MPs vote for assisted suicide.

However Dame Esther Rantzen made a plea to MPs last night, urging them to pass a Bill she said could ‘transform the final days of generations in the future’ and replace the current ‘cruel, messy criminal law’.

The broadcaster, who is terminally ill with cancer and has been a prominent supporter of assisted dying, said: ‘Please allow us terminally ill the dignity of choice over our own deaths.’