Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. We should use cord blood as a resource; the Anthony Nolan Trust is involved in setting up a cord blood bank for that very purpose, and that is wholly admirable. However, it does not detract from the need to provide for saviour siblings. I have given one example of where we needed a change. The other controversial issue is admixed embryos. There is a problem in producing stem cells because not enough human eggs are available, so there is a desire to use oocytes, mainly from cows. The results are not even true hybrids. Technically they are cytoplasmic hybrids; it is a question of denucleating an egg and putting in a human nucleus from a skin cell. That is not an embryo as such. In any event, the DNA involved is 99 per cent. human, and all the nuclear DNA is human. The 1 per cent. that remains is the mitochondrial DNA, which does not determine the character of what might grow. In any case, it will not be allowed to grow; it will never get beyond a small ball of cells. At 14 days, it will be destroyed and there is no question of implantation. What are people seriously worried about? People say that the issue is about the sanctity of human life and that human tissue is involved, but we routinely culture human tissue in laboratories throughout the world without people giving it a moment's thought. Why should things be so different because there is a reproductive implication? On this issue I strongly differ from those with religious views, because human life results from the whole human being; I do not see much humanity in my fingernail, for instance. It takes a whole organism to create a human being. There has been so much misinformation.