A fresh bid to legalise assisted dying was defeated in the House of Commons today as efforts to revive the controversial Bill fell at the first major hurdle.

MPs voted by 286 to 270, a majority of 16, to reject the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill at its Second Reading.

There were cheers and a shout of ‘good’ as the result was announced in the chamber, while some MPs could be seen hugging and pumping their fists.

It followed a passionate four-and-a-half hour debate in the Commons between supporters and opponents of assisted dying.

Many MPs spoke emotionally about their own personal experiences and the experiences of their dying loved ones.

The Bill had aimed to allow terminally ill adults in England and Wales with fewer than six months to live to apply for an assisted death.

It had been reintroduced by Labour MP Lauren Edwards despite its failure in the last parliamentary session when – although it passed two votes in the Commons – it fell in the Lords.

MPs voted by 286 to 270, a majority of 16, to reject the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill at its Second Reading

It followed a passionate debate in the Commons between supporters and opponents of assisted dying, with many speaking emotionally about their personal experiences

The Bill was rejected after a number of MPs abandoned their previous support for the legislation to vote against it this time around.

They included Labour former minister Janet Daby, who revealed she had ‘nightmares about dying and death’ after she voted in favour of the Bill last year.

‘I had to wrestle with myself, knowing that I was not entirely comfortable with the decision I had made, and my conscience was not at peace, and I cannot again, in good conscience, vote for the Bill,’ she told the Commons today.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage did not vote, while Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch and Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey both voted against the Bill.

Campaigners welcomed the fall of the Bill and claimed the Commons defeat meant the issue of assisted dying had been settled ‘for a generation’.

Ms Edwards had reintroduced the Bill to the Commons after taking over from its previous sponsor, Kim Leadbeater.

During today’s debate, she urged her fellow MPs to send the near-identical Bill back to the Lords ‘so that they can finish what they started’ in scrutinising the legislation.

But critics argued the ‘flawed’ Bill is ‘unsafe’ and told the Commons not to return it to the Lords unamended.

Opposition to the Bill had 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 (RCPsych), had also raised ‘serious concerns’ about the Bill, saying there were ‘too many unanswered questions about the safeguarding of people with mental illness’.

Mrs Badenoch warned against trying to ‘ram’ through the ‘badly drafted’ legislation.

‘It’s rushed, it’s badly drafted – and I say this as someone who is not, in principle, opposed to assisted suicide,’ the Tory leader said. ‘I think we need to be very careful about what we’re doing.

‘I don’t think our NHS is ready and I think this should be something that the Government does thoughtfully, not a private members’ Bill, let alone one which has failed before and which they’re trying to ram through with government numbers.

‘I think that’s wrong.’

Ms Edwards said MPs were being asked to consider ‘who ultimately decides the laws that govern our nations’ after the unelected Lords blocked the Bill last time round.

‘We owe it to the people that we represent to find a resolution to this issue, one way or the other, within this Parliament,’ the Labour MP for Rochester and Strood added.

But Dame Karen Bradley, a Conservative former minister, said previous supporters of the Bill should feel ‘no shame’ in opposing the draft new law.

She added: ‘You do not have to repudiate the vote you cast last time in order to vote differently today.

‘You do not have to decide that assisted dying can never be right. You do not have to abandon the compassion that led you to support the principle.

‘You need only ask whether this Bill, in this form, on the evidence before us now today, is safe enough for Parliament to force into law.’

Dr Zubir Ahmed, a cancer surgeon and former health minister, told the Commons that the NHS is ‘simply is not ready’ for assisted dying, adding that there can often be uncertainty in a doctor’s prognosis for terminally ill patients.

He told the chamber: ‘I have to be honest with you. When I am asked to prognosticate as to whether someone has six months to live or not, I am as often wrong as I am right.’

Ashley Dalton, another Labour former health minister, told the Commons that she herself has stage four metastatic breast cancer, which is incurable.

She said her cancer ‘is stable’ but warned she was unsure for how long drugs would continue to work.

Ms Dalton said: ‘Palliative care professionals and oncologists tell me that, whilst they can more or less give me an indication of when I’ll die when I’m a few days or weeks off, anything beyond that is the flip of a coin.

‘The six-month prognosis in this Bill is something no one can ever be really sure of.’

Supporters of assisted dying hugged and consoled each other outside the Palace of Westminster

But opponents of the assisted dying Bill celebrated outside Parliament after the legislation was rejected

The Bill had been reintroduced by Labour MP Lauren Edwards despite its failure in the last parliamentary session when – although it passed two votes in the Commons – it fell in the Lords

Fellow Labour MP Claire Hazelgrove, a supporter of the Bill, spoke publicly for the first time about her mother’s decision to bring her late-stage terminal illness to an end ‘on her terms’.

She said the ‘harmful status quo’ meant her mother died alone in October last year, after living with a rare blood cancer for half her life and argued ‘not all pain can be palliated’.

‘For Mum, it wasn’t a choice of life or death. It was a question of what kind of death she would have,’ she told the Commons. ‘She was clear that she didn’t want a painful or undignified death. She wanted peace.

‘For us, it will always be a tremendous personal sadness that the current law meant that she couldn’t tell us her plan, and we couldn’t say goodbye to her.

‘But more importantly than that, that she couldn’t say goodbye at the end of her life, or be surrounded by her loved ones, which is what she would have wanted for her death.’

Health minister Alison McGovern was visibly emotional as she concluded Friday’s debate on the Bill and told MPs the Government was committed to delivering social care reforms.

‘Many members and friends will know that in July, I lost my own mum,’ she said. ‘So I had a very practical education in this topic, and that experience will shape how I take this work forward.’

Mr Burnham had said he would not vote on the Bill so as not to ‘unduly influence the debate’.

The PM has previously argued there is a more immediate need to fix palliative care and social care than debate the legalisation of assisted dying.

In the last parliamentary session, the assisted dying Bill passed its Third Reading in the Commons in June 2025 by a majority of 23 votes.

Following the vote, Ms Edwards said the rejection of the Bill was ‘hugely disappointing’.

‘The objections raised today were not about the principle of assisted dying but about parliamentary process,’ she said.

‘The public, who strongly support a change in the law, will not understand why that couldn’t happen because a minority in the House of Lords used procedural devices to block it and MPs baulked at insisting that they do their job.

‘Assisted dying will come in this country, as it is already doing all across the world, but not soon enough.

‘Parliament has dropped the ball today. It will be picked up again as it must be, because the law as it stands is simply too cruel and too unjust to be allowed to stand.’

But Ms Dalton and fellow Labour MPs Meg Hillier and Jess Asato, who also voted against the Bill, said in a joint statement: ‘MPs have voted against this Bill because it wasn’t an abstract debate but a decision about a real Bill that was unsafe and unworkable.

‘But this is not a moment for celebration, we understand the deep concerns of so many people across the country who have campaigned hard for a change in the law.

‘But the truth is none of the relevant royal medical colleges, professional groups or experts will attest to the safety or workability of this Bill.

‘The PM is right; we must fix our NHS and sort out social and palliative care before we even consider introducing assisted dying.’

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch had warned against trying to ‘ram’ through the ‘badly drafted’ legislation

Ashley Dalton, a Labour former health minister, told the Commons that she herself has stage four metastatic breast cancer, which is incurable

Fellow Labour MP Claire Hazelgrove, who voted for the Bill, spoke publicly for the first time about her mother’s decision to bring her late-stage terminal illness to an end ‘on her terms’

Alisdair Hungerford-Morgan – chief executive of Right To Life UK, a charity that opposes the introduction of assisted dying – said: ‘This is a remarkable victory for the most vulnerable in our society.

‘They deserve protection and care, not a pathway to suicide.

‘After a two-year-long national debate, the country has decided to reject assisted suicide, settling the issue for a generation.

‘Evidence from overseas shows that, had this legislation become law, countless vulnerable people nearing the end of life would have been pressured or coerced into ending their lives.’

Andrew Copson, chief executive at Humanists UK, which supported the Bill, said: ‘This vote provides not one extra penny for palliative care or disability support. On the contrary, it makes it less likely.

‘And terminally ill people will still suffer, travel to Switzerland, and take their own lives in increasing numbers, while today’s inequalities continue.’

Sarah Wootton, chief executive of Dignity in Dying, claimed assisted dying was inevitable and a question of ‘when, not if’.

She said: ‘By refusing to send this Bill back to the Lords, the House of Commons has endorsed the wrecking tactics of a handful of peers who stopped Kim Leadbeater’s Bill being considered properly in the first place.

‘It will be seen as a failure of our democracy that a Bill, supported by three quarters of the public, has been blocked in this way.

‘Above all, it’s devastating for dying people and their families, who will face the consequences of today’s vote. Thousands of terminally ill people will continue to suffer against their wishes in their last days and weeks.’

Dave Sowry, chairman of My Death, My Decision, said: ‘This result is a travesty and desperately disappointing, first and foremost for terminally ill adults who were living in hope of having the choice to die peacefully and on their own terms.

‘It also leaves the current unsafe and unequal status quo exactly as it is. Those who can afford to travel to Switzerland can do so, while those who cannot are left without that choice and may be forced to endure suffering they desperately wanted the option to avoid.’

Toby Porter, boss of Hospice UK said: ‘We recognise that today’s vote will be deeply disappointing for those who have supported a change in the law.

‘But there is so much that can be done to improve choice at the end of life by investing in end of life care, including funding to hospices.

‘This would dramatically improve the choices available to the 150,000 people in England and Wales who currently do not receive the palliative care they need.

‘Right now nearly 60 per cent of hospices in England have made, or are considering, cuts to frontline services at a time when demand is growing. This means more and more people are going without the care and support they need.

‘While the proposed legislation on assisted dying will not progress, as a society we must not lose focus on the urgent need to fix the hospice funding crisis.

‘Opponents and supporters of the Bill must now channel their energy and passion into fixing it, to ensure everyone can get the end of life care they need.

‘The Prime Minister has recently stated the need to fix palliative care funding. His support is welcome, but his words must now be accompanied by meaningful action.’