Question
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answers by Baroness Thornton on 6 April 2010 (WA 393) and by Earl Howe on 20 December 2010 (WA 247), why cloned human embryos created using the nuclei from a patient with type 1 diabetes are still considered by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) to be necessary or desirable to improve treatment of this disease when no further discussion of this was included in the Research Licence Inspection Report and associated minutes pertaining to the meeting on 18 June 2008.
Answer
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has advised that the research licence committees of the authority exercise their functions in accordance with the procedure, and applying the criteria, prescribed in law. In reaching a determination, a licence committee will take into account the opinion of expert peer reviewers, including an opinion on whether the use of embryos in the proposed research is necessary or desirable for one of the purposes specified in the relevant legislation, and relevant general advice from the authority's scientific and clinical advances advisory committee. The HFEA publishes minutes of licence committees on its website at: www.hfea.gov.uk. The HFEA has also advised that it does not comment on past decisions made by licence committees and future licensing decisions will be made in the light of the best scientific and other relevant information available at the time.