The finish of assisted dying? Controversial Bill fails after bitter battle within the Lords… however supporters are ALREADY vowing to drive it via subsequent time

Assisted dying in England and Wales will not be legalised after a controversial Bill formally failed following a bitter battle in the House of Lords. 

The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill fell at the end of a debate in Parliament’s upper chamber on Friday.

While the Bill had successfully passed two votes in the House of Commons, albeit with a narrower majority on the second occasion, it did not face a vote in the Lords.

It instead ran out of time, with Lord Charlie Falconer – who had steered it through the upper chamber – saying he felt ‘despondent’ that a piece of legislation which he said was ‘so important to so many, has not failed on its merits, but failed as a result of procedural wrangling’. 

The Bill had proposed 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.

More than 1,200 suggested changes – believed to be a record high number for a piece of backbench legislation – were tabled in the Lords to the Bill.

Opponents branded the Bill ‘unsafe’, citing concerns around potential coercion of vulnerable people and a lack of safeguards for those with disabilities.

But supporters of the Bill expressed their ‘regret’ at its failure and insisted Parliament ‘must come to a decision on choice at the end of life as soon as possible’.

Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP who introduced the Bill in late 2024 and celebrated it passing two votes in the House of Commons, has vowed to enter a ballot to bring it back in the next parliamentary session.

On the eve of the Bill falling, Ms Leadbeater insisted she will ‘keep pushing for a safer, more compassionate law until Parliament reaches a final decision’.

Campaigners have said they could use the Parliament Act to get the Bill through if it was selected in the ballot of private members’ Bills in Parliament’s next session.

That Act, a rarely used piece of legislation, allows for Bills that have been backed by the Commons in two successive sessions but rejected by peers to pass into law without Lords approval.

As the draft legislation fell on Friday, Ms Leadbetter stood and held her hand to her mouth, shaking her head. 

Ahead of Friday’s debate, a letter to MPs, which campaigners said was signed by almost 200 peers, said the Bill ‘will fall as a result of deliberate delaying tactics pursued by a minority of peers opposed to its passage’.

Of the amendments listed, more than 800 were tabled or sponsored by seven peers.

The letter stated: ‘We regret that this failure will disappoint the overwhelming majority of people in this country who support a change to the law and were looking to Parliament to enact it.’

The peers’ letter noted no vote on the Bill had taken place in the Lords, and warned the ‘vital issue, which has wide public support, will not go away until it is resolved’.

They added: ‘It is now for the elected chamber to decide what should happen next. We believe Parliament must come to a decision on choice at the end of life as soon as possible.’

But Baroness Luciana Berger, a Labour peer who is a staunch opponent of the Bill, said it is ‘an absurd proposition’ for campaigners to try to bring the same Bill back, saying this would set a ‘very dangerous precedent’.

Antonia Bance, the Labour MP for Tipton and Wednesbury, said she would watch the fall of the Bill on Friday ‘with a profound sense of relief and thankfulness that so many Lords and MPs put the interests of disabled and vulnerable people over individualism, and refused to rubberstamp a law full of holes’. 

Alisdair Hungerford-Morgan, CEO of the charity Right To Life UK, which campaigns against assisted suicide and in support of better access to palliative care, said: ‘The assisted suicide Bill is now dead in this parliamentary session and mortally wounded beyond.

‘Despite spin from the pro-assisted suicide lobby, the Bill has not failed because of a determined filibuster by a select few. This is a misleading and dishonest myth.

‘Rather, it has failed because it is a badly drafted piece of legislation and, after appropriate and necessary scrutiny, peers have rightly determined that the Bill would not be safe or workable.

‘Using the Parliament Act to bypass House of Lords scrutiny of a Private Members’ Bill would be unprecedented and wholly inappropriate.

‘The Parliament Act have never been used to force through a Private Members’ Bill before. 

Dame Esther Rantzen, a leading voice in the campaign to legalise assisted dying, accused peers opposed to the Bill of ‘condemning generations of terminally ill patients to die in agony’.

The broadcaster and Childline founder, who is terminally ill, said she is ‘bitterly disappointed’ that some of those sitting in the Lords ‘have conspired to sabotage our democracy’.

Meanwhile, charities working in palliative and end-of-life care have warned Health Secretary Wes Streeting that momentum sparked by the national conversation on death must not be ‘wasted’.

Mr Streeting, who voted against the Bill in the Commons, is being urged by the specialist palliative care and hospice organisations to use this ‘critical moment’ to bring about the improvement they say is much needed for dying people.

An open letter – from Age UK, Hospice UK, Marie Curie, Sue Ryder and Together for Short Lives – described this as a ‘critical moment to turn shared ambition into action and deliver the improvements in palliative and end-of-life care that patients and families urgently need’.

It stated: ‘The national conversation surrounding assisted dying has brought renewed attention to the urgent need for high-quality, accessible palliative and end-of-life care.’