Rantzen announced lung cancer diagnosis in 2023 and became a vocal assisted-dying campaigner
• From Childline to changing TV for ever: Esther Rantzen’s revolutionary life
• Esther Rantzen: from That’s Life! to Childline – in pictures

Esther Rantzen, the Bafta-winning TV presenter and founder of Childline, has died aged 86.

In a statement, her family paid tribute to “the most wonderful mother” and “cherished grandmother”, whose “legacy of compassion and understanding will live on in her charities Childline and the Silverline, and through those of us who were lucky enough to love and be loved by her”.

Kylie Ellina Truswell-Mobbs, 52, walks out of court after receiving suspended sentence over 2023 death of David Ronald Mobbs

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A Queensland woman facing a potential life sentence after she gave her terminally ill husband a lethal cocktail of drugs has walked out of court to the sound of cheers.

Kylie Ellina Truswell-Mobbs, 52, pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to assisting suicide in the supreme court in Brisbane on Monday.

Bill’s failure in Commons sparks anger among its supporters after Lords blocked earlier legislation

A renewed attempt to legalise assisted dying has been voted down by MPs in a decision that is likely to scupper the idea for a political generation, sparking anger among supporters after an earlier bill was blocked by the Lords.

A private member’s bill put forward by Labour’s Lauren Edwards, which would have permitted assisted dying in England and Wales in certain limited circumstances, was defeated by 286 to 270 at second reading, the first chance MPs have to vote on a measure.

Bill would allow terminally ill adults with less than six months to live to end their lives, after the approval of a panel of experts

While the debate continues, we have a comment from Sam Royston, executive director of research and policy at Marie Curie. He said the government must address the crisis in palliative care regardless of what happens with assisted dying, calling for a new framework and funding to ensure everyone has access to compassionate end-of-life care.

He said:

Whatever happens with assisted dying, the UK government must fix the crisis in palliative care.

It is devastating that nearly one in three people die without the help they need. Too many spend their final days in pain or on busy, chaotic hospital wards, while families are left fighting for help instead of spending time with the people they love.

I think it’s absolutely right that, for instance, the prime minister and the government have said that improving palliative care must be a priority for him and his government. I think that’s something that we can all support.

I think everybody should have access to good quality palliative and hospice end-of-life care at their final moment.”

Broadcaster, 86, had intended to end her life in Swiss clinic after being diagnosed with terminal lung cancer in 2023

Esther Rantzen has said she is no longer able to travel to Switzerland to end her life because she has become “too physically fragile”.

Rantzen, who presented the TV current affairs programme That’s Life! for 21 years and founded the youth support charity Childline, had intended to end her life in a Dignitas assisted dying clinic in Switzerland after being diagnosed with terminal lung cancer in 2023.

Elise Burns and Keith Williams appeared in campaign filmed by Rankin this year – both were denied their wishes, but their relatives are picking up the baton

The feeling, said Sarah Burns of her sister’s last days, is one of overwhelming guilt.

“You feel really guilty, and helpless,” she says. “Because we knew what she wanted. We really did know. But we couldn’t do anything.”

Struggling with Alzheimer’s, the central character sets out on his final journey to a euthanasia clinic

The word “Alzheimer’s” never appears in Switzy, Emma Cline’s third novel, which arrives pre-endorsed as a Booker prize longlistee. But we can be certain that it is the disease afflicting its central character, David Hastings – certain in a way he finds it increasingly hard to be about anything.

When the novel begins, David and his assistant Cody are aboard a private jet flying from his home in the US to the UK. Landing at London City airport (which the book, experiencing its own senior moment, situates in the countryside), they visit David’s daughter and her family before travelling on to Zurich (hence “Switzy”). One more appointment, a catchup with an old boarding school roommate called Tom, awaits just over the French border, after which David will be euthanised at a facility resembling Dignitas.

A person’s wish to die can be shaped by whether they have access to proper palliative care – and in England and Wales, too many do not

• Zubir Ahmed is a transplant surgeon and former Labour minister

As a doctor, I have spent much of my professional life caring for people at some of the most vulnerable moments they will ever face. I have seen the anxiety that surrounds the prospect of dying, and the desperate wish of patients and families to avoid unnecessary suffering.

Naturally, we all want people facing the end of life to be treated with kindness and respect. But when considering the debate on assisted dying, true compassion demands that we ask a more fundamental question. What kind of society are we building if, before we’ve fixed the systems designed to care for people, we introduce a system designed to help them die? As a former health minister who has seen the system from the inside, I am able to say it is not ready or equipped to answer this question.

Zubir Ahmed MP is an NHS vascular and transplant surgeon, and served as the parliamentary under-secretary of state at the Department of Health and Social Care from 6 September 2025 to 12 May 2026.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Right to assisted dying established for patients with conditions assessed as incurable and causing unbearable pain

Legislation granting incurably ill adults the right to assisted dying has been formally adopted in France after the text was approved by the country’s highest constitutional authority and published in the official journal.

The law, known as a law on “end of life” or “aid in dying” rather than “assisted dying” or “euthanasia”, means France joins the small group of countries including the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and Canada to have legalised the practice.

Lauren Edwards dismisses party internal concerns and criticises ‘anti-democratic’ way bill was halted

The Labour MP Lauren Edwards who will bring the assisted dying bill back to the Commons has said she will not be dissuaded by concerns about Labour divisions, saying MPs should allow the House of Lords to finish its work on the bill after it was blocked from a vote by peers.

It also can be revealed that the Labour MP and disability rights campaigner Marie Tidball is to co-sponsor the bill, alongside the former minister Alex Davies- Jones.

MP for Rochester and Strood to use private member’s bill to put issue before MPs again after it was blocked by the Lords

The assisted dying bill is set to return to the Commons after the Labour MP Lauren Edwards agreed to use her private member’s bill to put the issue before MPs again.

Edwards said she wanted to give the legislation another chance because it had been blocked by the House of Lords after being passed by MPs. The return of the bill would give supporters a chance to use the Parliament Acts to potentially bypass the Lords if it was blocked for a second time.

Prominent backers including Louise Haigh say they would not support using Parliament Acts to pass bill

Prominent backers of assisted dying, including the former cabinet ministers Louise Haigh, Ian Murray and Jeremy Hunt, have told constituents they do not expect the bill to be resurrected using the Parliament Acts.

A growing number of MPs who backed the bill have suggested to their constituents they do not support the use of the act which allows the potential bypassing of the House of Lords, where peers blocked the bill.

The day I was diagnosed with motor neurone disease, I knew my life would end with euthanasia

I chose to die at 44 because ALS (motor neurone disease) left me paralysed. I still loved my life, even to the last day.

It all started in December 2023, when I lost strength in my right arm, and my pinky finger was going in all directions. I went to see my GP and did physiotherapy because they thought it was a nerve blockage.

Parliament’s failure to change the law on a difficult issue should be the spur to democratic innovation

The prorogation of parliament on Wednesday signals the end of the road for the terminally ill adults (end of life) bill. The proposal to allow some patients in England and Wales, under very specific circumstances, to have medical assistance in ending their own lives was still at committee stage in the Lords when the house rose. Since it was introduced as a private member’s bill, it cannot be carried over into the next session.

Campaigners for assisted dying are furious at what they see as procedural obstruction by unelected peers, bogging the bill down with heaps of amendments and running down the clock, thwarting the will of the elected Commons. Critics of the bill counter that the normal legislative process was followed and that the volume of amendments was a function of poor drafting, leaving practical and ethical problems that had to be addressed in the Lords.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Wendy Duffy died at Pegasos clinic in Basel as assisted dying bill in England and Wales fails to pass

A grieving mother has ended her life at a clinic in Switzerland four years after the death of her only child.

Wendy Duffy, 56, a physically healthy woman, died at the Pegasos clinic in Basel after struggling to cope with the death of her 23-year-old son, Marcus.

Labour’s Kim Leadbeater tells of plan to table identical bill that peers would be unable to stop

MPs and peers who led the assisted dying bill have promised to bring it back to parliament after it ran out of time in the House of Lords.

Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP who tabled the private member’s bill, said the plan would be to table an identical bill in the next parliamentary session, which would prevent peers blocking it again, as the Lords cannot stop the same bill twice.

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Rachel Waters gave morphine to her dying mother to ease her in her final hours. Then came the murder charge

Rachel Waters was in her apartment in Queens, watching food reviews on YouTube, when a nurse called: her mother was dying.

She needed to get to the memory care facility in Evans, Georgia, immediately. A physician had said Marsha could die within hours.

Data shows 209 cases recorded as assisted dying referred to CPS by police between 1 April 2009 and 31 March this year

Thirteen cases of suspected assisted dying are being considered by prosecutors in England and Wales, according to the latest data.

Encouraging or assisting the suicide or attempted suicide of another person is against the law in England and Wales, under the Suicide Act 1961.

In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org

Noelia Castillo, 25, a paraplegic, had suffered from psychiatric illness and lived in constant pain

A Spanish woman who spent months fighting her father for the right to euthanasia after being sexually assaulted and becoming paraplegic has finally ended her life on her own terms by means of an assisted death.

Noelia Castillo, 25, had struggled with psychiatric illness since she was a teenager and tried to kill herself in October 2022 after being sexually assaulted. The attempt left her in constant pain and using a wheelchair. Eighteen months later, she used Spain’s euthanasia law, which was introduced in 2021, to secure permission to end her life.

In Spain, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 900 525 100. In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie