Vote on knife-edge as backbenchers switch sides and urge colleagues to reject it

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has not said how he will vote on the assisted dying legislation, where MPs are free to vote with their consciences. (Photo / Future Publishing via Getty Images)

Labour MPs have turned against the assisted dying Bill and, at the eleventh hour, urged their colleagues to vote down the “drastically weakened” plans.

The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill returns to the Commons tonight NZT, where it is set to become law if enough MPs back it in a historic vote.

The Bill, under which terminally ill adults expected to die within six months could seek medical assistance to end their lives, was initially passed by 55 votes in November.

However, the vote is said to be on a “knife-edge” after a series of controversies about changes to the Bill that critics say weaken the proposed laws.

Labour MPs Markus Campbell-Savours, Kanishka Narayan, Paul Foster and Jonathan Hinder previously backed the Bill, but have announced that they were switching to vote it down.

In a last-minute letter to all MPs, they said: “The Bill presented to MPs in November has been fundamentally changed. This is not the safest Bill in the world. It is weaker than the one first laid in front of MPs and has been drastically weakened.”

One major point of contention is the dropping of a requirement for a High Court judge to sign off on all assisted dying cases.

Under revised plans, patients will be able to have an assisted death with the approval of two doctors and an assisted dying panel, made up of a psychiatrist, social worker, and a legal expert.

The MPs also warned that predictions of life expectancy could be wrong, with some patients given six months to live going on to survive for three years or more.

“No one should be robbed of the possibility of an extra three years of precious memories with loved ones. Christmases, birthdays, weddings, meeting grandchildren they never thought they may meet,” they said.

“If faced by the same decision, would any of us choose to end our lives if we knew there was a chance to live them instead?”

A fifth Labour MP, Dan Carden, also revealed that he was switching from abstain to no, as he felt legalising assisted dying “will normalise the choice of death over life, care, respect and love”.

Senior Conservatives have also been critical of the Bill. Danny Kruger, one of the leading voices opposing the legislation, said that it was a “world away from the limited, carefully safeguarded arrangements that the assisted death campaign promised us”.

Kruger said those who were approaching the end of their lives, or who were disabled, were vulnerable and “profoundly influenced by the people around us, not least because we are profoundly dependent on others”.

“We do not make decisions in a vacuum, and imagining we do – pretending that anxious, bullied or depressed patients have the ‘autonomy’ to make uninfluenced the most momentous decision it is possible for a human being to make – is infantile,” he said.

Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, said that the legislation was a “bad Bill” and had “not been done properly”, and urged Tory colleagues to vote against it alongside her.

More than 21 MPs are thought to have moved from either supporting the Bill or abstaining to no, with others still to make up their minds.

It is unclear whether there have been enough switchers to defeat the Bill, with its backers hopeful that support will hold to bring about the momentous change to the law. In order to stop the Bill, 28 MPs would need to change their votes from yes to no.

“The vote is on a knife-edge,” one figure helping count MP support told the Telegraph. The source also claimed that the number of MPs who abstained on the legislation could rise compared with the first vote in November, making it harder to predict the result.

If it passes, the Bill will go to the House of Lords, where it could be amended, but in effect it is almost certain that it will become law and come into effect by 2029.

If it is defeated, it is likely that it will be years before the question of legalising assisted dying is put before the Commons again.

There is confusion about whether Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, who has long supported legalising assisted dying, will vote for the Bill.

He has declined to publicly make the case for the change in an apparent attempt to make sure he does not influence the debate, given that MPs are free to vote with their consciences.

A Downing Street spokesman declined to confirm that the Prime Minister would vote to legalise assisted dying. He voted yes in November.

The vote stems from a Private Member’s Bill, which means it is being spearheaded by a backbench MP with the Government neutral on the issue.