Dame Esther Rantzen has revealed she is now too physically frail to travel to the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland as she once planned, despite the terminally ill campaigner having "spent the money and made the plans" to do so. The 86-year-old Childline founder made the admission in a statement urging MPs to back the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, which returns to Parliament for a Second Reading vote on Friday, saying the current law preventing assisted dying in England is "messy and cruel" and must "change and change quickly."

Rantzen, who first disclosed in December 2023 that she had joined Dignitas, said she had missed her window to travel because she needed to go while still well enough to make the journey alone, but at that point her illness had not yet become unbearable; by the time it was, she was too weak to go. She described the distress of loved ones now seeing her suffer pain and indignity. The Bill previously passed two Commons votes in 2024 and 2025 but stalled in the Lords in April, and has been reintroduced by Labour MP Lauren Edwards; supporters have suggested the rarely used Parliament Act could ultimately be used to pass it without Lords approval.