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Brown gives Free Vote on Embryology Bill

Published: March 26th, 2008
Printer-friendly version 26th March : Gordon Brown has bowed to the pressure to allow a free vote. Speaking at the launch of Labour's local election campaign, Gordon Brown has said Labour MPs - will have a free vote on three controversial parts of the Bill

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Breaking News: Gordon Brown gives Free Vote on Embryology Bill

This Easter weekend has seen a huge amount of media coverage on the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill. http://www.ccfon.org/media.php?lnTable=27

Today Gordon Brown has bowed to the pressure to allow a free vote. Speaking at the launch of Labour’s local election campaign, Gordon Brown has said Labour MPs “will have a free vote on three controversial parts of the Bill – IVF research, saviour siblings and Admix embryos” – the creation of animal – human hybrid embryos. He said “the measures were of huge importance, but added that he respected the ethical issues involved for some." 

Confusingly, however, the Prime Minister said: “"if the three bits are backed by MPs", he expects all Labour MPs to vote in favour when there is the final vote on the whole Bill. It is difficult to understand what this will actually mean in practice. Andrew Lansley MP, Conservative Health Secretary, responded to Gordon Brown's comments by saying it is unclear whether Labour MPs will be given a free vote and that Gordon Brown is 'still dithering' on the issue.  


Gordon Brown said: "I do believe that in stem cell research we have the power in the future to treat and to cure some of the diseases that have afflicted mankind for centuries."

Embryonic stem cell research "holds the key" to advances in the treatment of Alzheimer's, Parkinson, cancer and heart disease, he said.

"I have always said that although I attach huge importance to this legislation – to save lives and helping to cure and treat diseases – we respect the consciences of every Member of Parliament as they decide how to cast their vote on this," he said.

"But the Bill itself cannot be subject to a free vote because there are so many other changes that I believe are necessary as part of building up the research framework of our country and, of course, creating the right ethical framework for the development of embryo research."

It is vital we continue to apply pressure on Gordon Brown by writing to him on all aspects of this Bill. This weekend the Catholic Cardinals courageously spoke out on the Bill. It is vital that we show MPs that this is an issue for all Christians of every denomination and indeed for many people of no faith.

The most concerning deceit perpetuated by political and scientific proponents of this Bill is that it will permit the science that will find cures to killer diseases. It is as if they are saying that anyone who opposes the Bill is against scientific advancement and finding cures for these genetic disorders. Scientists claim that the protesters are irresponsibly scaremongering. Lord Winston, Scientist, Labour Peer and a leading proponent of the Bill, said of Cardinal O' Brien’s comments 'His statements are lying, they are misleading and I'm afraid when the Church, for good motives, tells untruths it brings discredit upon itself.' The untruth is the other way around. Since 1990 when Parliament last decided the law on embryos, experimentation has been allowed for up to 14 days on the human embryo. In that time there has not been a single cure discovered. Lord Alton made this clear in his various speeches during the passage of the Bill in the House of Lords 'so far all the scientific developments in terms of existing therapies have been achieved through adult stem cells — nearly 80 worldwide, with some 350 clinical trials under way using stem cells. There is not a single therapy, as my noble friend Lord Walton confirmed, anywhere in the world — maybe there will be, but there is not now — that uses embryonic stem cells. One of the reasons for that is often rejection. The beauty of adult stem cells is that they are taken from the patient themselves; that is why many hold that they will be the cells used in therapies in the future rather than for experimental purposes, which is what the Bill permits.'

 'The Bill is therefore utterly wrong to allow licences to be granted to create true hybrids.' 

 'To pretend that the creation of hybrid embryos from animal eggs will offer a desperate patient with motor neurone disease their only hope of a cure, as was prominently asserted earlier this year, is perpetrating yet another piece of fiction which does no service to the seriously ill.'

Williams Rees-Mogg, a journalist and Member of the House of Lords says:’ This was my second Embryology Bill. The first became law in 1990. I have some memory of those debates in the House of Lords in which there was broad agreement that cloning of an animal-human cell would be intolerable. The 1990 Act forbids it.’


In the House of Lords debates it became crystal clear that the Government is doing nothing less than redefining a human being. In a remarkably revealing admission, The Government Health Minister, Lord Darzi, said that, after some thought, the Government had decided that the hybrids in question were ‘at the human end of the spectrum’. Melanie Phillips, a journalist comments ‘It appears that an animal/human hybrid embryo can be said to be more human or less depending on the proportion of animal material in the mix, like a Delia Smith recipe.’

The other deceit being pushed out by proponents of the Bill is that the embryos would be mainly human so anyone objecting is overreacting because it is not about the creation of hybrid monsters. The Bill does, in fact, allow for various types of hybrids one of which is a true hybrid where a human egg is fertilised by an animal sperm or vice versa.



Peter Saunders, Christian Medical Fellowship launches blog with comment on false hope of Embryonic Stem Cells


http://www.cmf.org.uk/blogs/petersaunders/

Embryonic Stem Cells – the government is driving us up a dead end street


It is now nine years since the publication of the 1999 Donaldson Report, on which the government based its current policy on stem cells. Embryonic stem cells were apparently going to provide miracle cures for people with degenerative diseases like Parkinsons, Diabetes and Alzheimers. Immunologically compatible stem cells were going to be produced by therapeutic cloning, the same technology that produced Dolly the sheep.

Nine years is a long time in science. What has happened since? Human embryonic stem cells are yet to provide a single therapy for any human disease. Scientists are yet to produce a single stem cell line from a cloned human embryo. The technique is so inefficient that no one has yet grown a cloned embryo beyond the blastocyst stage. In the meantime the cost and risk to women of producing eggs in the numbers necessary has led scientists to turn to placing human DNA into animal eggs by using the Dolly method – animal human cytoplamic hybrids or 'cybrids'. Licences for this unproven therapy have been granted even before Parliament has considered the matter.

Ironically the very week that animal-human hybrids were being debated in the House of Lords last November researchers in Japan and the USA independently published research showing how embryonic stem cells (induced pluripotent stem cells or iPS) could be produced by reprogramming adult skin cells (fibroblasts) by the injection of just four genes. This technique has been further refined since by scientists all over the world and this year researchers have also succeeded in harvesting embryonic stem cells from embryos without destroying those embryos. Ian Wilmut, the scientist who created Dolly the sheep, has as a result abandoned therapeutic cloning, and hence animal-human 'cybrids' altogether. The Medical Research Council (MRC) has demonstrated where its own convictions really are now by ploughing millions of pounds into developing iPS – but don't expect to hear this on the media or from government ministers.

Meanwhile we have seen adult stem cells provide therapies for over 80 diseases and huge advances using cord blood. Ironically millions of potential samples of cord blood have not been collected because the government has put all its eggs in the embryonic stem cell basket.

Why does the government continue to drive up the scientific blind alley of embryonic stem cell research? The reality is that the PM and his cabinet have been seduced by the scientific institutions and the British biotechnology industry through a cleverly orchestrated misinformation campaign.

In 2006 the public rejected animal human hybrids – but public opinion began to shift as a result of a campaign led by Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris and Times Science Correspondent Mark Henderson who together put together a powerful coalition of Science Institutions, individual scientists and Patient interest groups in January 2007. They argued that we must keep all routes to possible therapies open, and used shroud-waving tactics to bring people onside. Opposition was marginalised as purely religious – and government and the public believed the lie that thousands of people would die unless we went down the route of missing species.

The reality is that most scientists worldwide have now abandoned therapeutic cloning and animal-human hybrids and are turning to adult stem cells.

When you hear government whip Geoff Hoon talking about his colleague who died from motor neurone disease by techniques derived form animal human hybrid embryos take it with a huge dose of salt. Hoon and Brown know little of the science here – they are simply Harris' and Henderson's marionettes parroting the embryonic stem cell hype that Blair imbibed with the Donaldson Report – but as government policy continues to be framed by journalists and Liberal Democrat bank-benchers the world has actually moved on. The government’s plans are based on yesterday's science.


If the government manages to bully this legislation through it is highly likely that it will yield not a single therapy, will divert resources down a dead end street while the rest of the world makes progress using ethical routes that will actually deliver and that Brown and his government will have a lot of explaining to do to the people with degenerative diseases and their families who had their hopes of miracle cures falsely raised. Embryonic stem cells, therapeutic cloning and animal human hybrids may well be consigned to a footnote in history regardless of what Parliament decides.

Links to the media coverage: http://www.ccfon.org/media.php?lnTable=27

Link to the HFE Bill Action Pack:

Please read the pack, give it to your churches and use the template letters to lobby MPs.

http://www.ccfon.org/docs/HFE_Bill_Preliminary_Pack_FINAL.pdf.

Stark reality of value of embryo in law — worth less than a chattel — Case of Jacqueline McGinn — what next?

In a case supported by the Christian Legal Centre a Belfast mother has lost a High Court battle to stop her ex-husband destroying embryos created during IVF treatment. Jacqueline McGinn, 39, went to court after Declan Bonner, 38, said he wanted the NHS fertility clinic to dispose of them. The couple, who have a seven-year-old daughter from one of the same batch of embryos that was stored, disagreed about what to do with the remaining embryos once they had reached a five-year storage limit under the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990.  Miss McGinn had hoped to prevent doctors at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast from destroying the embryos, having been told that they could be donated to a childless couple going through IVF treatment.

However, the High Court in Belfast ruled that under the 1990 Act, Mr Bonner's decision to destroy the embryos should take precedence.  Legal precedent says the man and woman who created the embryos must both agree before they can be used for IVF — even if it involves donating the embryos to another couple. Therefore, once one partner wants to destroy the embryos, their wish must be carried out. 

What is quite extraordinary here is that if, for example, a couple who had separated couldn't agree over a car, the car wouldn't be sent to the scrap heap. The embryo has less status in law than a chattel. Who knows how many embryos lie in frozen storage and what awaits them? Society needs to grapple with these massive issues. What is life? What value do we place upon it? Jacqueline McGinn calls the frozen embryos ‘her babies and the brothers and sisters of her daughter ’



Day Conference to equip Christian leaders to deal with the issues raised in the Bill: Demystifying the Bill and debunking the myth that the issues are complex

Calling Christian Leaders

On 21st April LCF/CCFON are hosting a day-long conference entitled “Communicating the Importance of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill”.

We believe that aspects of the Bill which offend God could be thwarted if Christians became involved in the political process at this time and applied pressure to their MPs and Government to choose LIFE. This conference will look at main areas of concern within the Bill and equip you to present them to your churches and church groups, and to mobilise your congregation to get involved.

The conference is taking place at 6-8 Marshalsea Road, London and will start at 10am and finish at 4pm. The cost of the conference is £20 (lunch and light refreshments included).

To book a place on the conference please e-mail Simone Lamont simone@ccfon.org or phone 0207 4076157.


Alive & Kicking Abortion Campaign

Please print off the Adobe Acrobat (‘pdf’) version of the petition and take it to your friends, workplace, church or school for others to sign. We need 80,000 more signatures.

Link to the printable petition: http://www.aliveandkickingcampaign.org/public/pdf/petition.pdf.

Debate in Oxford this Friday on Embryology Bill Evan Harris -v- Andrew Fergusson

Does the end ever entirely justify the means?

Following the presentation of a petition expressing concern over the controversial provisions of the HFE Bill, Dr Evan Harris, MP for Oxford West and Abingdon and one of the Bill’s main proponents, will meet with Dr Andrew Fergusson, Head of Communications for CMF (Christian Medical Fellowship), to debate the issues posed by this contentious legislation.  


If you live in the Oxford area please attend

Place: St Andrew’s Church, Linton Road, Oxford

Time:  8pm

Date:   Friday, March 28th at 8pm.

Link to the details of this event: http://www.passionforlife.org.uk.

Embryology Bill Tour—Time to Draw the Line—Future dates and venues

  • 27th March - Newcastle; St Mary's Cathedral. 7.30pm


  • 28th March - Kirkcaldy; St Bryce Kirk, St Brycedale Building, St Brycedale Road, Kirkcaldy KY1 1ET.  7.30pm

  • 1st April - Luton Rugby Club, Newlands Road, Luton, Beds LU1 4BQ.  7.30pm

  • 2nd April - Poole; St Mary's Longfleet, Longfleet Road, Poole BH15 2JD.  7.30pm

  • 4th April - Sheffield; City Church, The Jubilee Centre, Wilson Road, Hunters Bar, Sheffield, 7.30pm


Speakers so far have included Anne Widdecombe MP, Lord Alton of Liverpool, Jim Dobbin MP, David Burrowes MP, Geraldine Smith MP, speakers from the Lawyers Christian Fellowship and the Christian Medical Fellowship, CARE and others. 

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