Dame Esther Rantzen and her daughter Rebecca have campaigned relentlessly for assisted dying laws to be introduced in the UK because they don't want to see anyone go through the same pain.07:54, 11 Sep 2026TV legend Esther Rantzen’s daughter says she is spending most days now at her mum’s bedside witnessing the “ugly and horrible” reality of having no assisted dying laws in the UK.‌Rebecca Wilcox, 44, a journalist and consumer presenter, is urging MPs today to “do the easy thing” and vote 'yes' for the historic assisted dying bill. She says she cannot bear to see someone else going through a painful death.‌Today MPs will vote on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill and the Childline founder and her daughter Rebecca, have issued a plea to MPs to vote in favour of legalising assisted dying for England and Wales.‌TV legend Dame Esther Rantzen is receiving end-of-life care and in a statement released on Thursday revealed it is too late for her to "buzz off" to Dignitas as planned.Dame Esther, 86, who is terminally ill with cancer , says she is now "too physically fragile to make the journey" to Dignitas, despite having made all the plans.Her daughter, who will be on Parliament Square waiting for the results of the vote today due around 2pm, told The Mirror: “Today I hope it’s as simple as it needs to be because I am sitting by the side of my mother’s bed most days now, looking at what the alternative is if you don’t have assisted dying and it is ugly and horrible.‌“There is a huge amount of guilt because I worry that maybe she didn’t go because she wanted to spend time with us, she knew we wanted to be with her.‌“And there’s a huge amount of frustration that she has the mental capacity to want to get up out of that bed and get on a plane and go and she’s paid the full whack and every step of the way she’s filled out every form, had every conversation, there’s a lot of admin in this.“And she has kept on top of that and it’s her illness now that has absolutely grounded her and we are now left with what is the status quo. The status quo is undignified, it’s painful, it’s ugly and it’s unworthy of somebody like my mum and so many other people who are going through this.“She is brave and brilliant and clever and charismatic and she should not be going through what she’s going through. So it’s awful and anyone who has a loved one who has gone through cancer or are going through it themselves. I hope and pray it changes for them in the future.‌“I can't see anyone else I love go through this? Any pain is too much pain."If you think about the type of cancer she has and the treatment she has been given which is properly amazing, she is having every intervention and every help and the pain is still there. The discomfort is still bad. Medicine can only go so far.“Mum really wanted to make it to the 40th, which is October 26th and still wants to make it.”‌About the vote today, she told how she will be at Parliament Square to urge MPs to vote for the bill despite being upset about having to leave her mum’s side.“I don’t feel like we're square one. I think we are much further along than that because it has been proven through hours of scrutiny and debate that the majority of the MPs and in fact the majority of the Peers are in favour of this and most importantly the majority of the population. So all the MPs have to do is the most easy thing, just let it go through.“All they have to do is take it back to the Lords and they will handle it this time, there has been a lot of upset amongst them, they are furious about the behaviour of very few of them who have pulled the whole house into disrepute. They don’t block, they don’t sabotage and they don’t in their own words ‘cheat’ - which is what they did.”‌MPs will vote on what is known as Second Reading of the Bill, and if it passes it will continue its journey through Parliament for further consideration by MPs and peers in the House of Lords. It must pass both Houses to become law.While the Bill passed two votes in the Commons in 2024 and 2025, it ran out of time in the Lords in April and has been reintroduced by Labour MP Lauren Edwards where it must begin the parliamentary process again.‌It would allow terminally ill people in England and Wales with fewer than six months to live to seek an assisted death, subject to approval by doctors and legal professionals.Dame Esther’s statement this week described the current law in the UK as "cruel". She said: "Obviously, I would prefer that my end could be swift and painless and I could ask for help now I'm dying. But I can't. I knew it would be like this if I died in this country because the current criminal law preventing anyone to help me shorten my death is messy and cruel."Assisted suicide is banned in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, with a maximum prison sentence of 14 years and while it is a specific criminal offence in Scotland, assisting the death of someone can leave a person open to being charged with murder or other offences.Article continues belowWhile campaigners in favour of a change in the law say the Bill would offer choice to dying adults, those against argue it could pose a danger to the most vulnerable in society through coercion or feeling like a burden, and insist there are not enough safeguards in place.