Assisted dying is a step closer to being legalised in a major victory for Dame Esther Rantzen and the campaigning Daily Express.

MPs voted by 330 to 275 to allow a landmark Bill to proceed beyond a second reading for the first time in history.

Dame Esther said she was “absolutely thrilled” as she paid tribute to the hard work of Labour MP Kim Leadbeater and all those who supported her campaign.

She said: “A special thanks to the Daily Express for their brilliant campaign and to all the Express readers who have supported it. Well done!

“But don’t give up now, we will continue to need you over the next year or so until it actually becomes law. This is the first hurdle, but there will be many more to come.”

The Bill will now face intense line-by-line scrutiny by a Committee, before a third reading in the Commons and, if it passes, further votes in the House of Lords.

Dame Esther, 84, has fought to keep the issue at the top of the political agenda since revealing her stage four lung cancer diagnosis last year.

She added: “The work continues because the Committee stage is crucial in ensuring all the details in this new law are thought through, analysed and confirmed.

“I would like to add my personal thanks to Sir Keir Starmer for fulfilling his promise to me that Parliament would have time to debate this and that I would have the immense privilege of being able to hear the thoughtful and deeply felt contributions by the MPs who took part in it.

“It’s a tribute to our Parliamentary democracy that this vital issue will take a compassionate and caring step forward so that everyone will have a choice not to end their lives, but to shorten their deaths.”

An emotionally-charged debate lasting for five hours saw speakers share heartbreaking stories of people who had experienced agonising deaths or feared the impact of this potential societal change.

Tory Danny Kruger led the opposition and warned that “suicide is contagious”. He raised concerns that people would feel pressure to die because they are a burden or “the system has failed them”.

And Kit Malthouse – a long-time supporter of assisted dying – delivered one of the most powerful speeches of the day.

Warning that hundreds of horrific deaths would continue each year if MPs voted against change, the Conservative MP said: “If the Bill falls today, we are consigning those people to take their lives in brutal, violent ways, as they are doing at the moment.

“Or, for increasing numbers of our citizens, to make the trip to Switzerland if they can afford it.”