MPs have voted to approve a historic bill that would legalise assisted dying in England and Wales.
The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was approved by 314 votes to 291 at its third reading in the House of Commons – a majority of 23.
Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, who proposed the legislation, was seen crying in the chamber as it went through.
Campaign group Dignity in Dying hailed the result as “a landmark moment for choice, compassion and dignity at the end of life”.
The bill will now go to the House of Lords, where it will face further scrutiny before becoming law.
It would allow terminally ill adults 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.
MPs have deliberated the proposals for months, with a vote in November passing with a bigger majority of 55.
Since then it has undergone some significant changes, the most notable being the requirement for a High Court judge to approve assisted dying applications, which was replaced by the expert panel.
Ms Leadbeater, who brought the bill forward as a Private Member’s Bill (PMB) – the mechanism for backbench MPs to table legislation – has always insisted it would have the most robust safeguards of any assisted dying laws in the world.
Opening the debate on Friday she said that opposing the bill “is not a neutral act. It is a vote for the status quo”.
Health correspondent
A chain of events that started with the brutal murder of an MP almost 10 years ago has today lead to historic societal change. The like of which many of us will never see again.
Assisted Dying will be legalised in England and Wales. In four years’ time adults with six months or less to live and who can prove their mental capacity will be allowed to choose to die.
Kim Leadbeater, the MP who has made this possible, never held political aspirations. Previously a lecturer in health, Ms Leadbeater reluctantly stood for election after her sister Jo Cox was fatally stabbed and shot to death in a politically motivated attack in 2016. And this is when, Ms Leadbeater says, she was forced to engage with the assisted dying debate. Because of the sheer volume of correspondence from constituents asking her to champion the cause.
Polls have consistently shown some 70% of people support assisted dying. And ultimately it is this seismic shift in public opinion that has carried the vote.Britain now follows Canada, the USA, Belgium, Switzerland, The Netherlands and Australia. All countries with sophisticated health systems. Nowhere has assisted dying been reversed, once introduced.
The relationship between doctor and patient will now also change. The question is being asked: Is an assisted death a treatment? There is no decisive answer. But it is a conversation that will now take place. The final answer could have significant consequences, especially in mental health settings.
There are still many unknowns. Who will be responsible for providing the service? The NHS? There is a strong emotional connection to the health service and many would oppose the move. But others will argue that patients trust the institution and would want to die in its arms.
The challenge for health leaders will be to try and reconcile the bitter divisions that now exist within the medical community. The Royal Colleges have tried to remain neutral on the issue but continued to challenge Ms Leadbeater until the very end.
Their arguments of a failure of safeguards and scrutiny did not resonate with MPs. And nor did concerns over the further erosion of palliative care. Ms Leadbeater’s much repeated insistence that “this is the most scrutinized legislation anywhere in the world” carried the most weight.
Her argument that patients should not have to fear prolonged, agonising deaths or plan trips to a Dignitas clinic to die scared and alone, or be forced to take their own lives and have their bodies discovered by sons, daughters, husbands and wives because they could not endure the pain any longer was compelling.
The country believed her.
She warned that if her plan was rejected, MPs would be asked to vote on it again in 10 years time and “that fills me with despair”.
“There are essentially two ways we can look at the situation we’re in,” she said.
“We can look through a legal lens. As legislators, we have a duty to change the law where it is failing and when the last four directors of public prosecutions tell us that the law needs to change, surely we have a duty to listen?
“Most importantly, there is the human lens, which is how I approach most things. Giving dying people choice about how they die is about compassion, control, dignity, and bodily autonomy. Surely we should all have the right.”
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