“This issue is not going away,” Kim Leadbeater told the New Statesman in April. Her Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill – more commonly referred to as the assisted dying bill – had just fallen. It had been talked out in the House of Lords, where peers had tabled more than 1,200 amendments. Supporters were “very angry” she said. The fundamental democratic principle that the elected chamber, the House of Commons, should decide what becomes law had been violated, they argued. Opponents said otherwise. The Lords had simply fulfilled their duty at preventing a flawed and unsafe bill reaching the statute books. Wherever one stands, assisted dying is now back, just as Leadbeater promised.
A major difference this time round, however, could be whether the government chooses to allow time for its passage – and offer support – as it did with Leadbeater’s. What if that government is led not by Sir Keir Starmer, who is in favour of changing the law on assisted dying, but by Andy Burnham?
In 2015, when Burnham was last in the Commons, he abstained when assisted dying legislation came before MPs. Speaking to BBC Manchester in November 2024, however, he said he had changed his mind – sort of. “”, he said, explaining that a family experience in the intervening years had shifted his view. But then came the caveat. A major one at that. “While I would vote in favour of the principle of the bill,” he said, “in terms of the implementation of it, I would say there should be a kind of requirement that the hospices of this country get properly funded and sorted out before that law change comes in.” Burnham argued that palliative care was “not in the strong position it should be in”. “Consequently, you can’t have this law change with an underfunded hospice movement.”
Burnham’s position on assisted dying, therefore, appears far closer to that of his Labour leadership rival, Wes Streeting, than to other MPs who back the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. While not against the principle of assisted dying (Streeting had voted in favour in 2015), the former health secretary told MPs that end-of-life care was not in a condition where people at the end of their life would have genuine freedom to choose an assisted death.
Lauren Edwards, the MP for Rochester and Strood, has said she will reintroduce the legislation on Wednesday (17 June). The bill seeks to grant adults considered to have six months or less to live access to life-ending medication, subject to approval by two doctors and an expert panel. Edwards’ bill will be unchanged from Leadbeater’s, which cleared the Commons in June 2025. “,” Edwards wrote in a letter explaining her decision. But it is absolutely the case that supporters hope that the threat of these rarely used pieces of legislation being invoked will prompt peers to behave differently this time. Why else introduce the same bill?
The Parliament Acts of 1911 and 1949 allow for legislation that has been blocked by the Lords to become law without the upper house’s consent, if it is passes in the Commons – in the same form – in two sessions. To avail of the Parliament Acts, the Commons would not be able to make substantial amendments to Edwards’s bill, even though some supporters would admit there are areas that require strengthening. The Lords would be able to propose amendments, and send them back to MPs to vote upon, as with standard parliamentary procedure. What peers could not do is block the bill.
The chances of this approach succeeding are not clear. MPs might see the move as too risky and fear voting in favour of a bill they recognise needs strengthening. On the other hand, supporters of assisted dying would point to the widely felt unease at what went on before. Lib Dem leader, Ed Davey, said in March that he was “disturbed about the filibustering” that took place in the Lords and how “undemocratic” it looked. While Davey is unlikely to vote in favour – he is opposed to the principle of assisted dying – it is possible that he and others could abstain, making the maths more complicated.
Within hours of Edwards announcing her intention to resurrect Leadbeater’s failed bill, Labour colleagues (all of whom had voted against it) took to social media to vent their frustration. The move was “”, said Antonia Bance, “given everything going on in the world and here at home.” “,” argued Kirsty Sullivan. agreed: he could not think “of a more divisive issue within the country, Parliament or the PLP… It will only deepen division and distract Government from far bigger priorities”. Adam Jogee branded Edwards’ decision “”.
Should Burnham return to Westminster as MP for Makerfield on Friday (and later prime minister) it is hard to see a world in which he would welcome this Labour Party-dividing legislation. He will strive to bring competing factions together, not set them to war over an issue that does not top the list of concerns for most voters. (According to the Independent, legalising assisted dying came bottom of a list of Edwards’ constituents’ priorities that they would want their MP to focus on if they had the opportunity to make a law change over the next year.)
As with other policy areas, the views of Louise Haigh, the highly influential former transport secretary and current head of Burnham’s by-election campaign, might prove pivotal. Haigh has told one of her Sheffield constituents that she “would not support attempts” to invoke the Parliament Acts to force through the bill, the Guardian reported. Unlike the critics quoted above, Haigh supported Leadbeater’s bill.
Whether assisted dying becomes law in the coming months is, like much of British politics, highly uncertain. Neither of the two declared prime ministerial wannabes seem overly in favour. And few could blame anyone wanting to avoid starting a new term by sowing division and toxicity at a time of national crisis.
[Further reading: Assisted dying, an autopsy]
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