Parliament has dealt what looks like a decisive blow to assisted suicide in England and Wales, rejecting Labour MP Lauren Edwards' Terminally Ill Adults Bill by 286 votes to 270 at its second reading. The vote mattered more than a typical defeat because Edwards had reintroduced the same bill Kim Leadbeater steered through the Commons last year, banking on the Parliament Act to bypass the House of Lords entirely if MPs passed it twice. Friday's rejection ends that strategy for good. David Hahn traces the shift to new Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who broke from his predecessor Keir Starmer's public support for the bill and instead kept the government neutral, freeing Labour MPs to vote their conscience without reading the leadership's mood in the room.