Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Christine Jardine Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 11th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Lauren Edwards) for reintroducing this Bill and giving us another chance to debate the issue—although part of me regrets, as I will explain, that we have that chance. I respect everyone who has taken the responsibility of coming here today to debate this again, and I particularly respect those who have shared their very moving personal stories with us all.

Most of all, though, I respect and I would like to apologise to those who are again going through the trauma of waiting to find out whether they will have the choice. I have huge sympathy for them, because they believed when we originally passed this Bill and sent it to the other place that, if they needed it, in four years’ time they would have the choice. It would be in their hands. That hope has been snatched away from them—and not by us.

We fulfilled our responsibility to the electorate. We spent hundreds of hours in Committee, in private discussions, in debates and on Report, going over this Bill in minute detail until we could, with confidence, send to the other place the best Bill we thought possible. Of course, we thought that it would amend it and bring things back, but we had fulfilled our role and respected the will of the British public. Unfortunately, when the Bill went to the other place, that was not what happened. A handful of peers blocked it.

[Jess Asato]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Christine Jardine]

Sorry, I will not take interventions.

Those peers did not show the same respect for the repeatedly expressed will of those who face the end of their lives.

[Sam Rushworth]

Does the hon. Member acknowledge that the handful of peers she refers to include the former presidents of the British Medical Association and Royal College of Psychiatrists, a leading professor of palliative medicine, a former chief executive of NHS England, two former Attorney Generals and the former president of the family division of the High Court?

[Christine Jardine]

I do, but they are each one individual, and each of the professional organisations is neutral, and believe me, I envy them on that.

We have the responsibility to make the decision. The majority of us have already said that this is the best Bill we can produce. We—the majority of us—have made that decision once already, and we sent it to the other place. If we do that again today, I hope that those in the other place listen and take that on board and that the handful of peers who blocked it—

[Rachel Taylor]

The hon. Lady speaks with great passion. Does she agree that members in the other place bringing forward amendments such as suggesting that women who had been through the menopause, or men, needed to have a pregnancy test before they could be eligible for an assisted death, was a deliberate attempt to wreck the Bill, as opposed to undertaking their important role of scrutiny?

[Christine Jardine]

I completely agree, and it did the other place no credit at all that they did that.

There is something interesting and noticeable about all the experiences we have heard today. I have personal experience, which I admit influences my view. I saw my mother go through a very painful death and wished that she had had the choice. I do not know what she would have done, but I wished that she had had the choice. What is interesting is that we have all taken different things from those experiences. Some of us have said that we cannot do it because of that experience, and others have said that we must do it because of that experience, because we have all made decisions. We all have the right to make decisions for ourselves, and that can surely be no more important than when we face the final decision that we will face. It is for that reason—to respect that choice, to respect a decision that has already been made in this place, to respect the will of the British people—that I ask the House to send this Bill back to the Lords for approval.