At last, the chance to legalise assisted dying in the UK – and end the untold, unnecessary anguish | Polly Toynbee

Tory MPs opposed to this human right have been swept away. On Friday in the Lords, a path towards choice will finally be set

Every Labour government forges ahead with life-changing liberal reforms, and this one will be no exception. Expect the right to die to be one of this government’s landmarks, removing one of the last barriers to freedom over our own bodies. Everyone must die, but the greatest dread is exiting the world through a torture chamber. Once assured that we need never bear the unbearable, death would lose much of its sting.

While other countries allow the mortally ill to be released from the last stages of life if they wish, the British have been denied that choice, mainly by the power of religious lobbies. Only God can decide how long we should suffer before death comes at a time of his pitiless whim, they say. Humanists UK has tussled with them for years on this. Yet faith campaigners have defeated a change in the law time and again, despite religion being a fading preoccupation.

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist

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