With 70 votes for and 56 against, the Holyrood Scottish Parliament decided to give the go-ahead to the legislation that permits assisted dying even if this is not a final vote yet. The legislation – granting many terminally-ill competent patients the option to take their lives with the help of doctors, if two doctors confirm that the patient suffers from a late-stage progressive disease – has therefore passed the first stage in the parliamentary process. From now on, it will be discussed and amended by the Committee before being voted on by Edinburgh’s MPs again. The MPs have been let free to vote as they liked, according to their conscience, without any guideline from any party, but some voters stated they would vote against the legislation, such as the current Prime Minister, John Swinney, as well as the two Prime Ministers who came before him, Humza Yousaf and Nicola Sturgeon, and the Labour Party leader Anas Sarwar and his deputy Jackie Baillie. According to the British pro-life charity “Right to Life”, the fact the legislation passed the first stage in the parliamentary process with a very small majority might mean it will be defeated at the final vote, which is decisive at the third and last stage of the parliamentary process. The “Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults”, as the law is called, was proposed back in 2021 by the Liberal Democrat MP Liam McArthur. The last attempt at decriminalising assisted dying dates back to 2015, but the Scottish Parliament had rejected it.