Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [Lords]

That raises the question of whether we should extend the use of saviour siblings not only to life-threatening conditions, but the wider threshold of serious illnesses. In time, their use may be extended to illnesses beyond those that the hon. Gentleman mentioned. That is why we must consider the safeguards carefully. However, I will deal with the process of regulation shortly. Rather than removing the phrase ““other tissue””, the Government wanted to encompass the whole matrix of umbilical cord blood, in respect of research suggesting that cells of the umbilical cord, rather than the cord blood, may offer potential for treatment. That is the Government's primary focus when using the phrase ““other tissue””. However, one cannot be wholly satisfied with that response. In the debate in the other place, in response to Lord Alton of Liverpool, who was particularly concerned about the possibility of ““other tissue”” being extended to other regenerative tissue, such as part of a liver or a lung lobe, Baroness Royall of Blaisdon said:"““With regard to parts of an organ, the Bill has been drafted in this way to allow the use of cells of the umbilical cord or, for example, if it were possible in the future to treat conditions with cells cultured from a small biopsy from the liver or any other organ.””—[Official Report, House of Lords, 21 January 2008; Vol. 698, c. 23.]" Reference was made in the debate in the other place to muscle as regenerative tissue and to ensuring that the Bill was inclusive enough to allow for biopsies from muscle for future treatments. The Government's position on defining ““other tissue””, as well as including umbilical cord blood and bone marrow, is inclusive. It seeks to deal not only with the current circumstances, but future treatments that may follow. That raises profound questions. Those questions have been raised in correspondence between Lord Alton of Liverpool and Lord Darzi, in a letter dated 25 January, which not only questions the Government's position on ““other tissue”” in detail, but questions why, if the Government are focusing primarily on umbilical cords as the donation source, they are not minded to omit the word ““blood”” from between ““umbilical cord”” and ““stem cells””, so that the Bill would read ““umbilical cord stem cells””. Would that not be sufficient to capture stem cells from both the cord and cord blood? If not, would adding ““and cord”” to the existing wording, so that it read ““umbilical cord and cord blood stem cells””, be sufficient? I invite the Minister to respond to that. However, if she feels that that approach would not wholly incorporate both the cord matrix cells and a small biopsy of regenerative tissue, why are the Government not explicit in the definition of ““other tissue””? The concern remains that ““other tissue”” as currently defined still raises the spectre of part organs being available for donation, whether regenerative or not. I say, ““not””, because then we come to the regulatory role of the Human Tissue Authority after the child is born and the possibility that the courts could be involved too, in decisions relating to transplants of whole or part organs from children. That spectre is raised because, as I intimated in my point of order, it is currently not within the remit of the Bill to deal with those details as they affect the Human Tissue Authority and its regulation. We are only one side of the coin, but the House does not have the opportunity to put into primary legislation its concerns about how far a saviour sibling could go in terms of donation. We all need to be aware that once the embryo is tissue typed, it has implanted an immune matched sibling for life and is known to have organs compatible with the older sibling, whether the initial reason related to tissue typing or not. That raises the danger that a saviour sibling could become a lifelong donor.