MPs to vote again on assisted dying as Bill returns to Parliament

MPs will have another chance to vote for or against assisted dying legislation on Friday.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham has already confirmed he will not cast a vote on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill so as not to “unduly influence the debate”.

Childline founder and former broadcaster Dame Esther Rantzen has once again added her voice to calls for the law to be changed, but actor Liz Carr is among campaigners calling on MPs to vote the Bill down amid safeguarding concerns.

The legislation proposes allowing adults in England and Wales, with fewer than six months to live, to apply for an assisted death subject to the approval of two doctors and an expert panel.

While it passed two previous votes in the Commons, it ran out of time in the Lords in April – amid claims of a “denial of democracy” from supporters who criticised some peers for tabling hundreds of amendments and effectively talking the Bill out.

Lauren Edwards, the MP who has re-introduced the Bill to the Commons, taking over from its previous sponsor Kim Leadbeater, has urged her fellow MPs to send the Bill back to the Lords ” so that they can finish what they started” in scrutinising the legislation.

She described debate around the Bill as “one of the most significant national conversations we have had”.

If MPs vote the Bill through on Friday, it will be subject to further debate, amendments and they will have another vote on the Bill as a whole at what is known as Third Reading, before passage to the Lords for scrutiny and then back to the Commons.

While legislation has to pass both Houses to become law, supporters have previously suggested a rarely used piece of legislation could be invoked to pass the Bill this time around if it is stalled again in the Lords.

The Parliament Acts allow for Bills that have been backed by the Commons in two successive sessions, but rejected by peers, to pass into law without Lords approval.

In a letter on the eve of the Bill’s return to the Commons, one backer and one opponent suggested MPs are “potentially being presented with a ‘this or nothing’ ultimatum”.

Gareth Snell, who voted for the Bill, and prominent opponent Dame Meg Hillier warned there is “no handbrake in the Parliament Acts process” should it reach that stage, and cautioned their colleagues of the “extraordinary risk”.

While Bill backers Sarah Champion and Kit Malthouse defended the Parliament Acts as “one of the foundations of our democracy” they said there is “no reason for the Parliament Acts to apply”, and added “it is not their intention that they should do so”.

MPs will vote according to their conscience rather than along party lines and the Government has said it remains neutral.

Opposition to the Bill has been voiced by the leader of Catholics in England and Wales, Archbishop Richard Moth, who called it  “wrong in principle” and “deeply flawed” as well as the Church of England’s Archbishop of Canterbury, Dame Sarah Mullally.

Medical colleges, including the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Royal College of Physicians have also raised “concerns” about the Bill and safeguarding society’s most vulnerable against coercion.

Ellen Clifford, from the Disabled People Against Cuts (Dpac) national campaign group, raised the risk of inadequate social care impacting those with the greatest needs if assisted dying was legalised.

She said: “Disabled campaigners are urging MPs to turn up and vote against the Bill on the basis that it is an actively dangerous piece of legislation.”

But Sarah Wootton, chief executive of pro-change campaign group Dignity in Dying, said: “The current law creates secrecy, fear and trauma.

“This Friday, MPs can replace it with honesty, compassion and choice.”

Mr Burnham previously said he believed the funding of palliative care needs to be fixed before consideration can be given to legalising assisted dying.

Ms Edwards has insisted that “we can and should do both”.

Marie Curie, Hospice UK and St Christopher’s hospice charity are all neutral on the principle of assisted dying but have repeatedly warned access to and quality of end-of-life care is too patchy across the country and that the sector is severely lacking in funding.

With the Bill’s return, end-of-life campaigners insist “the need for more urgent and ambitious action to fix end-of-life care could not be clearer”.

Dame Esther Rantzen, in a statement urging MPs to vote for the Bill, shared her anguish at loved ones seeing her “suffering pain or indignity” as she receives end-of-life care and confirmed it is too late for her to “buzz off” to Dignitas as planned.

She told how despite having “spent the money and made the plans” to go to Dignitas, she was now at the point where she is “too physically fragile to make the journey”.

Dame Esther said she is not trying to “impose my choice on anyone else, but I believe they should have no right to impose their choice on me”.

In a letter last month, the Assist Us To Live coalition which is backed by Carr and comedian Rosie Jones, said they were “writing to call for a halt to the legislative process around assisted dying until disabled and terminally ill people have as much support to live as this Bill would provide for us to die”.