A Labour MP's new bill to legalise assisted suicide has been called a "major threat".

Kim Leadbeater, Labour MP for Spen Valley, has announced she will be tabling an assisted suicide bill in the House of Commons.

The bill is expected to be tabled on 16 October. Right to Life UK, which opposes assisted suicide, said it was now "very likely" that a vote on the issue would be held in Parliament before Christmas.

The question of whether terminally ill people in England and Wales can end their lives with medical assistance was last debated in Parliament in 2015, when the proposals were defeated.

Announcing her plans, Leadbeater said that "now is the time" for a fresh debate. The bill would need to pass in both the Commons and the Lords to become law.

Catherine Robinson, spokesperson for Right to Life UK, said that opposing the plans was going to be a "very big battle".

She is encouraging people to be informed on the issue by watching the BBC documentary "Better Off Dead?", which sees actor and disability rights advocate Liz Carr travel to Canada to see how the legalisation of assisted suicide has worked out there.

Assisting a person to take their own life is a criminal offence in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and carries a prison sentence of up to 14 years. There is no specific crime of assisted suicide in Scotland but helping someone to end their life may lead to a prosecution for culpable homicide. 

Dr Gordon Macdonald, head of Care Not Killing, which opposes assisted suicide, said: "I would strongly urge the government to focus on fixing our broken palliative care system that sees up to one in four Brits who would benefit from this type of care being unable to access it, rather than discussing again this dangerous and ideological policy."

Baroness Grey-Thompson told the BBC she was opposed to Leadbeater's plans because of concerns "about the impact on vulnerable people, on disabled people, coercive control, and the ability of doctors to make a six-month diagnosis - but also the time and capacity they have to make sure it's someone's settled wish".