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After a number of votes - and accusations of time wasting - on amendments, the main debate for today on assisted dying is underway.

Labour MP Kim Leadbeater is proposing the legislation and is kicking things off with a speech.

She says it is an "honour and a privilege to do so".

The MP adds that it is "not often we are asked to wrestle with issues of morality, ethics and humanity".

Leadbeater says there are "good deaths and there are bad deaths - and I, like many, have experienced both".

She also praises the way in which the debates have been carried out in the past.

While Leadbeater is delivering a fairly chunky speech, Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle says that most MPs should limit themselves to five minute contributions.

In here speech, Leadbeater takes some questions from MPs - including those opposed to her bill.

Asked by multiple MPs how she responds to various experts - psychiatrists and palliative practitioners particularly - saying the bill is not a good one, Leadbeater says there is a range of opinions in different professions.

The Labour MP says that voting against her specific bill is a vote in support of the status quo.

This is a position challenged by Richard Burgon  - another Labour MP - on the basis that many experts don't oppose assisted dying in principle but this specific bill.

But Leadbeater repeats her earlier rejection - that different experts have different opinions.

We spoke too soon on our last post - one of the amendments we expected to go through on without a vote is now being voted on due to some objections in the chamber.

This amendment looks to be expanding the powers of the bill to the whole of the UK, rather than just England and Wales.

Sky political correspondent Liz Bates says that one MP who is supporting the bill has told her this vote is a delaying tactic from those opposed to it.

The Conservative benches look a bit emptier than Labour's - and the Tories tend to be more opposed to assisted dying, so this might be a contributory factor.

The amendment passes by 66 votes - 275 to 209.

And then we get another surprise vote... so again this could be more stalling.

The votes taking place in the House of Commons at the moment are somewhat of a technicality.

The most recent change that went to a vote was defeated 266 to 213. 

This is a majority of 53.

Interestingly, it is the same majority as the previous vote - but with fewer MPs.

This shows that, while more MPs are arriving in the chamber, the balance of voting is staying consistent.

It's also worth remembering that the bill passed by a majority of 55 in November at the last vote.

Some amendments are going through "on the nod" - without a vote.

This is because they already have broad support from the House of Commons.

The first vote on amendments is defeated.

This would have made it that someone who is "substantially motivated" to end their own life because of things like mental disorders or disability, would not qualify for assisted dying.

It was defeated by 261 votes to 208.

Then, a couple of amendments backed by Kim Leadbeater are passed without a vote as they are seen as adding safeguards to the bill.

MPs are now voting on amendment number 24 - which would disapply the presumption that a person has capacity unless the opposite is established.

The Commons has only been sitting for a few minutes today, and we already have a division - or vote.

But this is not the big vote on whether the bill will pass. 

Instead it is a vote on a proposed amendment to the bill.

This one - if passed - would make it that someone who is "substantially motivated" to end their own life because of things like mental disorders or disability, would not qualify for assisted dying.

We'll be getting a few of these in a row for next hour or so, and then will get on with the main debate.

MPs are debating the assisted dying bill.

Follow the goings-on in the Commons in the stream at the top of the page.

Unsurprisingly, protesters and campaigners on the two sides of assisted dying debate are gathering in Westminster.

They will be hoping to persuade wavering MPs as they make their way in to the debate.

If the assisted dying bill is passed today, it does not mean the legislation becomes law.

Instead, it will head across the Houses of Parliament to the House of Lords.

There, it will also be subject to the scrutiny of the close to 1,000 peers of the realm.

It is hard to say how the legislation will go through the upper chamber - as the combination of a private members bill and a free vote is an unusual one.

However, there remains a chance, albeit small, that the upper chamber delays and obfuscates the bill to stop it by keeping it in limbo until the king's speech to parliament later this year.

The chances of the scenario are slim, though.

But there is some jeopardy, as the usual reluctance of the Lords to block a Commons-supported bill is somewhat reduced due to it not being a government backed measure.

Lisa Nandy is speaking to Sky News this morning on behalf of the government.

A longstanding backer of changing the law around assisted dying, she says she will be support the legislation in today's vote.

It's worth noting at this stage, that the government is not making its MPs vote one way or the other.

Nandy says the debate around the bill has been "considered and respectful" and she does "really respect the views of colleagues who take a different view".

She adds that she "hopes the bill succeeds today".

Asked if she is worried about the number of MPs changing their minds, Nandy says people have been swapping from both sides to the other.

She says that have shifted position "should be commended for that" as it's what the "parliamentary process is for".

But the minister says it is "too early" to know which way the vote will go.

She adds that the government will "respect" whatever parliament decides.