𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

Dame Esther Rantzen’s daughter summed up the mood perfectly as supporters in pink gathered outside Parliament on Friday morning, telling the crowd it felt like “some dreadful Groundhog Day”. Rebecca Wilcox, 46, added: “None of us should be here because we’ve already done this. The country has already voted on this. We all know that was the right decision, and we’re here again.”

She was right — we had lived this moment before, 651 days earlier when Kim Leadbeater’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill passed its second reading on November 29 2024. Then, MPs backed the landmark legislation by 330 votes to 275.

This time, following its reintroduction by Lauren Edwards MP, both the pro- and anti-bill camps had agreed the result was on a knife edge. The mood among supporters in Westminster was solemn but hopeful.

Dame Esther revealed this week that she was now dying in the manner she had feared — suffering pain and indignity despite receiving the best possible care, and too “fragile” to make the journey to Dignitas. Her voice breaking with emotion, Rebecca added: “I should be next to Mum, holding her hand.”

Opponents gathered nearby with placards bearing stark warnings such as “choice for the few means coercion for the many” and “don’t make doctors killers”.

At around 2pm, the pink rally formed a tight huddle around a speaker and listened nervously as the Commons debate drew to a close. Some held hands with friends or loved ones while others bowed their heads in quiet contemplation as MPs divided to vote.

When the result was announced, it became clear that this Groundhog Day was ending differently; MPs had voted by a narrow majority of just 16 against allowing the assisted dying bill to continue towards becoming law.

The reaction from campaigners showed their sheer devastation. Dozens of people burst into tears as an anguished shockwave spread through the crowd. Most heartbreaking to witness was the effect of the news on people like Sophie Blake, a terminally ill mum who has given so much of her time to this fight over the last two years.

Despite living with incurable breast cancer and a raft of worsening health complications, she has attended almost every rally and event in Parliament to make the case for change. Yesterday, she arrived wearing a pink dress with a matching walking stick.

Through sobs, Sophie, 53, told reporters that the bill’s opponents had “never heard our voices” as they repeatedly made arguments about hypothetical suffering while ignoring the very real pain of people like her.

She added: “They didn’t want us to have our own bodily autonomy, to be able to take control at the end of our lives. That’s all we wanted. We never wanted to take anything away from anybody else. They have taken our choice to be able to live in peace while we navigate our lives with life-limiting diseases.

“Now, people who can afford to go to Dignitas — many of the people who would have voted for this today — can go abroad…and have the peaceful death that they have denied all of us.”

One of the most common arguments against the bill cited the poor state of palliative care in this country. Sophie added: “Of course it should be funded but even the best palliative care doesn’t work for everyone. Talk to all the bereaved family members here who have witnessed that.

“Until [MPs] are diagnosed with a terminal illness themselves and understand what they potentially face, they will never know what we have to live with and deal with.”

Sadness mixed with anger as campaigners expressed disbelief that a small group of peers who blocked the bill’s progress in the House of Lords had managed to overturn the decision MPs made last summer. Many had assumed the bill was safely on its way to becoming law after it passed a third reading in June 2025.

Josh Cook, 35, lives with dormant Huntington’s disease and knows the inherited condition will eventually cause his nerve cells to decay. His mum suffered from the same condition and took her own life in 2024.

He said: “The group of MPs in there who have turned around and shattered the dreams and hopes of the terminally ill. They have taken choice away yet again when it’s needed most.

“They all need to take a long, hard look in the mirror and hang their heads in shame. Choice and compassion is what we asked for. We’re adding a choice, not taking one away from anybody, and that has been forgotten about.”

Josh questioned whether those MPs who cited palliative care as a reason to vote against the bill had ever before lifted a finger to try to improve end-of-life services.

He added: “There is no palliative care option for the way that I will die, which is choking on my own saliva. That’s what Huntington’s will take me to.

“The only solutions I have are to die with dignity at my own hands, as it stands, so I will lose even more time with my loved ones. When I do take my own life, that will be on [the politicians’] hands.”

Once the shock of the result had sunk in, many campaigners had one more thing to say: this is not the end.

Amid the tears and fury, there was also a steely determination that the fight will continue and that MPs will be forced to consider this issue time and again until they agree a way forward for assisted dying.

After more than four years of campaigning, there is no denying that this is a bitter blow to the Express Give Us Our Last Rights crusade. But let there be no doubt — we will not stop fighting for choice, dignity and compassion at the end of life.