What are the changes to the Assisted Dying bill and how will MPs vote?

MPs are debating the Assisted Dying Bill for the first time since it passed its first stage in Parliament last year.

In the months since that historic vote, several changes both large and small have been made to the bill introduced by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater.

However, the most important fact remains: it would give terminally ill people in England and Wales the right to choose to end their lives.

Leadbeater says her bill is the only one in the world with ‘three layers of scrutiny’: sign-off by two doctors and a High Court judge, and would offer the ‘safest choice’ for mentally competent adults at the end of their lives.

She has stressed that the bill is capable of protecting against coercion.

It passed its second reading in November with a clear majority of 330 votes to 275 – though many MPs said they could change their decision in the future depending on what amendments are introduced.

A similar bill passed its initial stage in the Scottish Parliament earlier this week.

What is Assisted Dying?

This, and the language used, varies depending on who you ask.

Pro-change campaigners Dignity in Dying say that assisted dying allows a person with a terminal condition the choice to control their death if they decide their suffering is unbearable.

They argue that, along with good care, dying people who are terminally ill and mentally competent adults deserve the choice to control the timing and manner of their death.

But the campaign group Care Not Killing uses the terms ‘assisted suicide’ and ‘euthanasia’ to refer to the practice. The focus should be on ‘promoting more and better palliative care’ rather than changing the law.

The disabled, elderly, sick or depressed could be especially at risk.

What is the current law?

Assisted suicide is banned in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, with a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

In Scotland, it is not a specific criminal offence, but assisting the death of someone can leave a person open to being charged with murder or other offences.

What has happened to the Assisted Dying Bill so far?

As you read this, MPs are debating lots of different tweaks to the draft bill. Changes that Leadbeater has said will ‘strengthen’ the proposal.

‘Put simply, if we do not vote to change the law, we are essentially saying that the status quo is acceptable,’ she said today.

Amendments being hashed out include:

• No obligation on anyone to assist in the process
• Increasing the commencement period from two years to four years
• Preventing medical practitioners from raising the option of assisted dying with a patient first
• Requiring doctors to have detailed training on domestic abuse and safeguards for autistic people
• Allowing people with a neurodegenerative illness to access assisted dying if they were judged to have 12 months left to live
• A person would not meet the requirements for an assisted death ‘solely as a result of voluntarily stopping eating or drinking’
• Funding hospices and care homes cannot be conditional on offering assisted dying

Dame Esther Rantzen, a broadcaster who is terminally ill, has called on MPs to support the legislation.

Labour MP Naz Shah is behind an amendment intending to stop people with anorexia seeking assisted dying.

She told the Commons: ‘I’ve spoken to parents of a girl who had… diabetes and complexities of anorexia. They came to parliament and they said the law that helped them, the law that assisted them, because their daughter wanted to go to Dignitas was because it would have been illegal, and that’s the law we today are trying to change.

‘If the safeguards in this bill fail, even once, it will be a young woman like Jessica who dies, it will be parents like Leslie and Neil who lose a child. That is a terrible tragedy no family should ever have to endure.’

Not all MPs are on board with the law. Conservative MP Rebecca Paul said she opposed the bill as it ‘will harm more people than it will help.

‘And those people who will be harmed are among the most vulnerable in our communities and I’m not willing to accept this collateral damage,’ she added.

Labour MP Jess Asato accused Dame Rantzen of being ‘distasteful and disrespectful’ for saying that those against the bill have ‘undeclared personal religious beliefs which mean no precautions would satisfy’.

How did my MP vote on assisted dying?

You can find out how your MP voted in last year’s assisted dying debate by searching the government’s website here.

What about the rest of the UK?

If the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill passes through its remaining stages and gains royal assent, it will apply only to England and Wales.

Scottish Liberal Democrat MSP Liam McArthur has published a bill which if passed, will allow people living in Scotland with a terminal illness to be given help to end their life.

It is the third attempt to make assisted dying legal in Scotland, after two bills were previously voted down.

In March, the Isle of Man became the first part of the British Isles to approve the legalisation of assisted dying following a landmark vote in the capital of Douglas.

Meanwhile, any move to legalise assisted dying in Northern Ireland would have to be passed by politicians in the devolved Assembly at Stormont.

Last May, Jersey’s parliament voted in favour of drawing up laws to establish an assisted dying service on the island for terminally ill people and, if the law is approved, the earliest it could come into effect would be spring 2027.

Who will qualify for the new bill?

Only terminally ill adults with less than six months to live who have a settled wish to end their lives would be eligible under the new law.

One of the other amendments introduced by Leadbeater during the committee stage increased the maximum time the government could take to implement assisted dying from two years to four years.

The private member’s bill would make it illegal for someone to persuade a person through dishonesty, coercion or pressure to declare they wanted to end their life or to induce someone to self-administer drugs to die.

Anyone found guilty of doing so would face a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

Terminally ill people who have been resident in England and Wales for at least 12 months would have to take the prescribed medication themselves.

Has the issue been voted on at Westminster before?

Not for almost a decade. An Assisted Dying Bill, which would have allowed some terminally ill adults to ask for medical help to end their lives, went before the Commons in 2015 and was rejected by MPs.

There was also a bill proposed in the House of Lords during the 2021/2022 session which reached a second reading in the chamber, while a Westminster Hall debate on assisted dying took place in July 2022.

What are the views of the public?

This varies. Research by the Policy Institute and the Complex Life and Death Decisions group at King’s College London (KCL) in September suggested almost two-thirds of people in England and Wales want assisted dying to be legalised for terminally ill adults in the next five years.

But it showed the changeable nature of some people’s views, with some of those voicing support saying they could change their minds if they felt someone had been pressured into choosing assisted death or had made the choice due to lack of access to care.

Overall, the polling found a fifth (20%) of people said they do not want assisted dying to be legalised in the next five years, while 63% said they do.

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