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Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [HL]

My Lords, I do not suspect the intentions of the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, but what she proposes in her amendment was what the House intended in the regulations approved in 2001 and 2002 and, indeed, in the 1990 Act. The HFEA’s licensing procedure is already tight and I am not persuaded by what she said that these amendments would make it any tighter. At the moment, when a research application comes to a licensing committee of the HFEA, it has already gone to a local ethics committee and must have received the approval of two peer reviewers, who have to go through a substantial form answering some of the questions that the noble Baroness has put down in her amendment. For example, the form asks whether the research could be achieved using means other than embryos, whether it is really necessary, how many embryos are likely to be used and whether it is likely to be successful. There is a reference to whether there are enough significant research papers and whether enough significant research has been done, for example, on animals. All this has to be considered first by the peer reviewers, after which the application comes to the licensing committee, which again considers all those questions. At the end of every meeting on a research licence application, there is a formal decision tree to which the chair of the committee must go to ensure that these questions really have been faced and answered satisfactorily. While I entirely respect the intention of these amendments, I believe that the procedure is already tight and I am not convinced, were these amendments to be approved, that it would be any tighter.