What a bill is
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A bill is a draft piece of legislation put before parliament for debate and, potentially, eventual passage into law. Until it clears every required stage and receives formal assent, a bill has no legal force whatsoever, no matter how widely it is discussed or how confident its backers might publicly appear to be about its prospects.
Bills can originate from the government of the day, from an individual member, or occasionally from another chamber entirely, and each type tends to follow a slightly different path through debate and committee scrutiny before a final vote is eventually taken on its merits, regardless of the specific circumstances involved.
Tracking a bill's progress, from its first reading through committee stages to a final vote, is one of the clearest ways to see how proposed policy is tested, amended, and sometimes abandoned entirely before it could ever become binding law for the wider community it would affect.