Legislation prompts a rare sight in the Commons: intelligent and polite debate

Who would have guessed? All too often debates in the Commons are partisan affairs, punctuated by jeers and braying. Where reason is superseded by dogma and ill-temper. This was a very different occasion.

- John Grace

Parliament, on its very best behaviour. People – mostly politely – agreeing to disagree. MPs heard in silence. Some in tears. Even more remarkable was the feeling there was intelligent life on view. The quality of argument was a cut above the average.

There again, this was no ordinary debate. Most Fridays, Westminster is a ghost town with MPs back home minding their constituencies. But this was an exception. The day when a private member's bill to legalise assisted dying for the terminally ill took its first step to becoming law.