Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [HL]

My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Knight, because her Amendment No. 92A should command widespread support throughout your Lordships' House. The arguments have already been put extremely well, not least by my noble friend Lord Neill. Noble Lords have emphasised the importance of looking again at the implications of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. I follow the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, in emphasising the importance of parliamentary scrutiny. Your Lordships' House is regarded as the guardian of our legitimate rights and as probably the only place—it is certainly the case in this instance—where issues of this sort can be properly and thoroughly scrutinised. Some 260 new lines have been added to the Bill. They were not part of the Bill when it left your Lordships' House, and they were added after the assurances we were quite sincerely given by the noble Baroness the Leader of the House, who we all respect. She told us emphatically that: "““The Bill sets out to ensure that human and human-admixed embryos may only be created for research purposes, and only where the person to whom the cells belong gives their explicit consent””.—[Official Report, 21/1/08/; col. 52.]" There is no doubt that that was said with sincerity on the Floor of the House, and it was repeated, in effect, in the letter that the noble Lord, Lord Darzi, sent to us in January. He wrote: "““This is likely to include a person’s right to determine under what circumstances their genetic material is used to create a human embryo or human admixed embryo””." Referring to Article 8, he wrote: "““The use of a person’s genetic material, without their express consent, to create embryos and their subsequent use and storage would interfere with a person’s rights under Article 8 of the convention””." Nothing has changed since we were given those assurances in January, except for what is now in the Bill. It was guillotined in the other place. Only 14 Members were present at the debate that took place in the Standing Committee, which means, in effect, that 632 Members were prevented from having any say on these provisions because when the Member of Parliament for Stone, Mr Bill Cash, moved an amendment to do what the noble Baroness, Lady Knight, is seeking to do this evening, it was not reached. The Bill was guillotined and a three-line Whip was used to see it through. That is no way to make legislation of this kind where these hugely important questions are involved. We have been told about the legal opinion given by Aidan O’Neill QC. A further opinion has been given today by Mr James Bogle of 10 Kings Bench Walk, Temple, who reaches the same conclusion. He wrote: "““For all the reasons that I have canvassed above, I consider that there is good reason to consider that a successful challenge could be mounted against the presumed and substituted consent to research provisions of the Bill and I am not satisfied that the government’s claims, upon advice, that these provisions, without the inclusion of any further and/or better safeguards, are all Convention-compliant is sufficiently well-founded””." This level of advice and the conflicting views we have heard about the compatibility of Article 8 make it doubtful whether the words on the very face of the Bill stating that it is compliant with the European Convention on Human Rights are accurate. That should surely make us want to consider this further. We would not be doing our job properly if we did not now take the opportunity to send this part of the Bill back to another place so that they have the chance to debate these provisions, to look at their compatibility and decide how best to proceed. I conclude simply by reminding the Minister of what happened in my own city of Liverpool at Alder Hey children’s hospital when science went too far. Presumed consent was believed to be in the interests of patients and organs were taken from children. It brought a wonderful children’s hospital into total disrepute. The National Health Service had to think again, very thoroughly, about these questions. This could jeopardise the whole altruistic and well-founded movement of people providing organs and tissue for medical purposes, if they believe that the state is taking on the vestiges of an authoritarian entity that decides it knows best. The noble Baroness, Lady Knight, is right to remind us of the importance of these questions. I hope noble Lords will support her amendment.