2nd reading of Assisted Dying Bill - 11 September 2026

[IwantToRetire]

Write to your MP - Share the MRP polling and ask them to oppose the assisted dying Bill

Despite its many serious flaws being repeatedly exposed in the House of Lords in the previous session and the ongoing warnings of medical Royal Colleges and groups representing vulnerable people, the assisted dying Bill has been reintroduced to Parliament by Lauren Edwards MP.

Assisted death regimes across the world bring with them an inherent risk of grave harm to vulnerable women. The Other Half and other campaigners, academics and experts have highlighted this risk consistently, and it is profoundly frustrating that our concerns have so far fallen on deaf ears, with Lauren Edwards reintroducing essentially the same Bill as the one which failed to pass in the previous parliamentary session.

By introducing a virtually identical Bill, Lauren Edwards has paved the way for the Bill to pass through unamended, and for the Parliament Acts to be used in order to bypass scrutiny from the House of Lords and for the Bill to become law with its flaws intact.

Polling conducted on behalf of The Other Half has shown that the public overwhelmingly does not view this Bill as a priority for MPs, and the new Prime Minister has also been clear that addressing existing failings in palliative and social care should take precedence over any consideration of assisted dying.

There are specific dangers in the Bill, highlighted in the previous parliamentary session, which Lauren Edwards has chosen not to address: these include the removal of coronial investigation, the lack of a requirement for families to be informed about an assisted dying application, and the omission of specific protections for domestic abuse victims/survivors.

Only 12 MPs need to change their minds from how they voted in the previous parliamentary session for the new Bill to fail. We can win and make sure this Bill is thrown out, with your help.

We are asking you to write to your MP to highlight your concerns and ask them to make sure that Lauren Edwards’ new assisted dying Bill is stopped at Second Reading on 11 September.

Every vote will count, and it takes just 60 seconds to contact your MP. Please take action today.

https://www.writeonad.theotherhalf.uk/
(Not sure how effective it is to use a web generated standard letter.)

See more about The Other Half https://theotherhalf.uk/

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill 2026-27
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-12181/

And I am of the view that just one case of torturing someone for weeks (or longer) justifies that our current system of refusing to end their life immediately, is immoral.

“Torturing”?

This is what was alluded to on the previous page about manipulative emotive arguments. Describing how humans have dealt with death since the beginning of our existence and the cultural normal in every country without AD as an act of deliberate malevolence isn’t going to win people over.

No one is being “tortured”. End of life can be very painful, miserable, and feel torturous, or what they imagine to be torture to the person, but it’s not a deliberate act.

So they are not morally equivalent.

My body, my choice

No one is stopping you doing anything. You are not arguing “my body, my choice” you are arguing “my body, the State must help me with my choice”. Which is different.

It's hard keeping people alive, it isn't hard killing someone. It's one injection.

End of life care isn’t “keeping people alive”. The vast majority of people usually want some extra time and for that to be as comfortable as possible. If it’s “keeping people alive” it’s not end of life care, that’s oxymoronic.

We also keep forgetting something. The person who wants to die will not care any more if things go / went wrong.

Well of course 🙄. No one is claiming their ghost will be hanging around trying to get justice like Patrick Swayze.

But if the wrong person is killed their family might care. Or if the procedure is botched. Or if it transpires they were manipulated.

You're thinking about this from the 'selfish' perspective again: yours

Absolutely incorrect. If you had read the full thread you would have seen that I personally want AD for me. But I am prepared to but aside my own desire to protect the vulnerable.

The person who wanted to die is no longer suffering.

If you can guarantee that the person definitely wanted to die and that it wasn’t for something they could be helped with (like depression in Canada 2027). That’s all most of us with concerns want. Can this be 100% guaranteed?

It's definitely accurate to call it torture.. prolonging pain when you have the means to end it is an act of torture. And it's splitting hairs to pretend you have to be the one physically creating the pain for it to count.

We treat animals better than this.

All arguments relevant to this topic are emotive and have validity, please don't try to block valid arguments by labelling them emotional blackmail. Otherwise: why bring up 'vulnerable women' and 'disabled people'. Are they more deserving than the countless voices telling you they are suffering and want this to go ahead? And I include you. You have the right to want this too.

And it's splitting hairs to pretend you have to be the one physically creating the pain for it to count.

It isn’t splitting hairs. The definition of torture is a deliberate act of causing pain and suffering. It’s insulting to all the people who provide care to the terminally ill to say what they’re doing is deliberately causing pain and suffering.

please don't try to block valid arguments by labelling them emotional blackmail.

Feel free to make your arguments. But don’t expect anyone to take it seriously because you’re making an equivalence between palliative care and Guantanamo Bay.

Otherwise: why bring up 'vulnerable women' and 'disabled people'.

Because, as evidenced by this thread, people are more than willing to put their own selfish desires above those who can’t represent themselves, so they need advocacy.

Are they more deserving than the countless voices telling you they are suffering and want this to go ahead?

It’s not about who is “more deserving”. It’s about ensuring vulnerable people aren’t ensnared in something quite devastating and definitive.

To turn this around, why are you so willing to ignore the risk to this group to ensure your own needs are met above all else? Is that morally and ethically acceptable?

I agree.
It's really hard to have an honest conversation about this but I'm not 100% convinced that protocols are followed to the letter when it comes to people in extreme pain.
I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Do I have an issue with this? Absolutely not.

Because we have become overcautious and no longer turning a blind eye when the doctor does the morally right thing and slipping the patient in extreme pain a bit extra we've now got crap like assisted dying on the cards.

Ok lets tell pet owners that vets are killing thie or pet and not ending their suffering or putting them to sleep. Vets are killers so are the owners.

'Do not resussitate' pathways provide a route to permitting the severely ill/terminally ill to die - but which do not involve active intention to kill.

Nothing in my post remotely suggests your reply.

Vets that euthanise pets are killing them, they may also be ending their suffering or otherwise providing a service (for which they will be paid) at the request of an owner for a whole bunch of possible reasons. They are not 'putting them to sleep', they will never wake up, but that's a euphemism for killing that people understandably feel more comfortable using.

Personally I think saying someone with terminal cancer, for example, is going to be 'put to sleep' sounds weird. I'm not sure why, possibly because I relate it with euthanising pets. Saying they're going to be killed, while accurate, is far too stark. Probably why we dance around saying it.

I think that's very true and it's why I do use the word kill because it is what we're doing. It's interesting how as a society we're so uncomfortable with using the word.

I do think tho that's also my personal reaction to the dancing around language that went on/still goes on with discussing trans issues and the euphemisms abd deliberate manipulation of language with that eg "top surgery" no it's an elective double mastectomy. Muddying language & lack of definition makes it easier fur badly drafted legislation to occur

as I've said earlier in the thread, I do think the tactics that were used by the pro lobby in the commons are remarkably similar to the #nodebate tactics used by stonewall

Difference is this is assisted thoigh ultimately you as a person have to dminister drugs yourself, so yes you are still killing yourself its just a more peaceful way of going then all the other alternatives. Why shouldn't we have that choice then whats ont he table now.

Agreed. I can't believe that a mental health condition can be treated as terminal - although I can see in the case of that poor young woman who was gang raped there might really be no way back.

Very disappointed that this bill didn't pass. I don't think it would have a been a slippery slope. The six months rule meant it was incredibly restrictive and you can't give someone cancer so you can coerce them into dying sooner. I suppose you could badly injure them so they are going to die eventually but if you are that evil you would murder them anyway wouldn't you? I think people have a right to decide what to do with their own bodies.

David Mitchell has a take

www.facebook.com/Channel4/videos/assisted-dying-advert-mitchell-and-webb-are-not-helping/2945339759187832/

I think that modern medical care does make the situation different from the past. Eg. In previous centuries, dementia was less common as fewer people lived long enough to reach it, or if they did, they might pass away sooner due to illnesses or infections that are now treatable.
However, I do NOT think this means we should allow assisted dying. Pps have mentioned that before Shipman pain relief may have been prescribed more, and thus should be reviewed, but otoh we don't want this being abused.

Apparently Switzerland and the Netherlands both have high support for it regarding terminally ill adults but their laws are more restricted than Canada, I think, and were rolled out over a longer period.

And dreadful cases of teenagers have caused controversy in both as that doesn't seem to have been what it was originally planned to be for.

Re the young woman who was gang raped, do you mean Noa Pothoven? Her case was terrible and an indictment of the health system there but I don't think she died by euthanasia. :

'In May 2019, Pothoven stopped eating and drinking. She had previously been put into an induced coma in 2018 so doctors could feed her through a feeding tube, but Pothoven's family decided to respect her decision in 2019, and provide only palliative care.[11][5] On 30 May 2019 Pothoven made a final Instagram post in which she said: "After years of battling and fighting, I am drained. I have quit eating and drinking for a while now, and after many discussions and evaluations, it was decided to let me go because my suffering is unbearable."[3][5][12][13] On 2 June 2019 Pothoven's sister confirmed her death at the age of 17. Pothoven spent her last days in a hospital bed in her family's living room while saying goodbye to her friends and family.[14]
The family responded in the Dutch media about their regrets that it has been suggested in foreign media that their daughter died from active euthanasia and said they "hope that her story serves a higher purpose and that help provided to vulnerable young people with psychological problems in the Netherlands will be improved. Noa pleaded for an institution where young people like herself can go for both the psychological and physical help they need."[18]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoaPothoven

It might have been this poor young woman

Spanish woman to die by euthanasia after long legal battle with father - BBC News https://share.google/mpx3LR56gdlMPKst4

I hadn't noticed until now this part of her story

She said she was first sexually assaulted by her ex-boyfriend of four years after she had taken sleeping pills to help her sleep

Another Pelicot.

Refusing care is a real possibility though, and probably something that needs to be discussed more.

I don't mean DNR - in many cases they are handled sensibly. But people - and its really the general population, not doctors alone - need to think seriously about when they want to treat illness in old age.

For example - my dp's grandmother took about 10 years to die of heart failure, she also had osteoporosis. She was miserable for a number of years, asking "Why am I not dead?" Well, the reason was clear, they'd been treating her all along - she was still on medications to keep her alive as she was asking the question. She's had a pacemaker put in some years previously. When she had pneumonia, they gave her antibiotics.

Now I am not making specific suggestions about what things ought to have been done. But there are a lot of questions that could be asked about treting these things in a woman over 80 with a serious degenerative disorder.

There was a doctor a few years ago who wrote a book about his decision not to be treated after age 75, other than palliative measures. For pretty much anything. His view was that once things begin to go really wrong post 75, you are on a downward road. It can these days be pushed out an extra 10 years, but they won't be good quality. His preference was to last the amount of time his genetics dictated, whether that was 76, 85, or 100, and have a fairly swift decline after that.

I've encountered that a lot among doctors and nurses. But they won't recommend that to patients typically until our culture changes it's thinking.

That's far preferable to assisted death imo.

The Doctors don't because as I said before preservation of life at a costs. Keep people alive that's their oath. Not whether its the right thing to do.

I still don't see why it impossible to write a bill that has robust safeguarding. It sounds like it would be very popular. I'd support it.