Cell Nuclear Replacement

EDM number 457 in 2001-02, proposed by Ann Winterton on 21/11/2001.

That this House notes the successful legal challenge by the Pro-Life Alliance through a Judicial Review showing that the Human Fertilisation & Embryology Act does not cover human clones produced by the 'Dolly' technique (cell nuclear replacement); notes that Mr Justice Cane's judgment agreed there is no law governing this form of cloning and that the Human Fertilisation & Embryology Authority has no authority either to license or to ban work in this field; recalls that honourable Members of both Houses challenged the Government's right to change the law by Statutory Instrument allowing the production of human clones for research exercises; further recalls the Government's opposition to the Lords amendment urging that no decision be taken on the Statutory Instrument until after the Judicial Review; recalls also EDM 37, 'Request For Full Debate On Human Cloning', which asked the Government to cite those sections of the 1990 debates on the HFE Bill to support its claim that the issue had been thoroughly debated; notes the Government's failure to do so; regrets the failure of a majority of honourable Members in both Houses to scrutinise properly the Government's claims, thus allowing the manipulation of procedure which denied Members the right to full debate; and calls on the Government and honourable Members to investigate fully the claims of so-called scientific experts advising the Department of Health whose assertions that human embryonic clones are vital for research into many diseases, assertions which world-wide research in the last year has shown increasingly to be without foundation.

This motion has been signed by a total of 27 MPs.