UofG Centre for Public Policy

23 March 2026: University of Glasgow expert Dr Naomi Richards reflects on the rejection of the Bill in the Scottish Parliament last week, how the issue is playing out in other parts of the UK, and the unintended constitutional consequences the issue has thrown into view.

Blog by Dr Naomi Richards, University of Glasgow

Last week, MSPs spent 21 hours across 4 days debating the proposed Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults (Scotland) Bill. But after intense scrutiny and raised expectations among proponents that parliamentary opinion might finally have shifted in favour of legalisation, the Bill was rejected by a decisive 69 votes to 57. With a margin of 12, in the end, the vote wasn’t nearly as close as expected.

Proponents certainly had reason to believe that 2026 might have been the year the UK embraced this new end-of-life option. Last year, the Stage 2 debate in Holyrood produced a very different vote: 70 for, 31 against, 11 abstentions, and 17 did not vote. In November 2024, the UK’s House of Commons voted 330 to 275 in favour at the Stage 2 reading of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. At the Third Reading in June 2025 this narrowed to 314 to 291 but was still a vote in favour of legalisation. Elsewhere, the British Crown Dependencies of Jersey and the Isle of Man have voted more decisively in favour – most recently Jersey voted 32 votes in favour, 16 against in February this year. All-in-all the last 18 months felt as if the legislative tide was turning.

But it was not to be the case. The 70 MSPs who voted for the Bill at Stage 2 were, it turns out, voting only in favour of more deliberation and additional scrutiny. Even with the additional safeguards added at Stage 3, not enough were convinced. Objections ranged from concerns about coercion or subtle pressure being exerted – people feeling like a burden - which would be difficult to detect, concerns that people would opt for it because of a lack of access to palliative care, and the possibility of future expansion of the eligibility criteria (the classic slippery slope argument).

Ultimately, I think there was a sense that this new life ending choice would have ramifications well beyond the small numbers who would make use of the law (in other jurisdictions with equivalent eligibility criteria, less than 1% of those dying each year make use of the legislation).

Its bigger impact was always going to be on the broader choice landscape and conversations with healthcare professionals and amongst families. And its impact would have been felt widely across the NHS and hospice sector.

And with an election just round the corner, perhaps with hindsight it was inevitable that politicians would err on the side of caution and vote to maintain the status quo for fear of what change may bring.

South of the border, a different picture has emerged. Although the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill was voted through the House of Commons, it has stalled in the House of Lords with more than 1000 amendments tabled. This is the most amendments tabled for a Bill for almost 20 years. While there was considerable commentary during the Stage 3 debate on the Scottish Bill about the “considered, respectful” manner in which the debate was conducted, and with remarks that the process showed “how democracy should work”, the stalling in the House of Lords has prompted some in Westminster to fundamentally question the role of the unelected second chamber. It has been reported that the blocking of the Bill has in fact re-focused political attention on constitutional reform, with two of the Bill’s high-profile supporters forming a new all-party parliamentary group on reform of the House of Lords.

It would appear that there may be unintended consequences to the pursuit of lawful assisted dying after all… but of the constitutional variety rather than the slippery slope variety. Ultimately, as the Lords runs the clock down, England and Wales are heading for the same outcome as Scotland – no legal access to assisted dying.

This leaves all eyes on Jersey and the Isle of Man as the closest ‘test cases’ to watch in terms of the implementation of assisted dying laws within the British Isles.

Assuming these laws get Royal Assent – and there is some question over whether they will, which may precipitate its own constitutional crisis – this will mean there is a new form of pressure that will be exerted on politicians via media stories, and a new evidence base from which to draw, the next time this issue comes around. And there will always be a next time.

Author

Dr Naomi Richards is Director of the End of Life Studies Group at the University of Glasgow.

She has studied assisted dying for 20 years and teaches the fully online course Assisted Dying: Rhetorics vs. Reality which can be taken either as continuous professional development (CPD) or as part of the End of Life Studies PGCert/PGDip/MSc Programme.

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Image: Assisted Dying Laws by Nick Youngson CC BY-SA 3.0 Pix4free.org

 

First published: 23 March 2026