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Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [HL]

My Lords, I strongly agree with the amendment but I am not absolutely convinced that the wording needs to go into the Bill. However, it seems to me that it must go into the code because, if we are serious about the welfare or the good of the child being the most important consideration in offering treatment to women or couples who want it, we must try to ensure that children are not brought up under a misconception about their genetic parenthood. That is one of the most obvious cases of immoral treatment of a child, and it can be embarked on only by parents who are thinking more of themselves than of the good of the child. Nearly all people who adopt children nowadays tell their children at a very early stage that they are adopted. I think that we should take on that model for the treatment of children born by donation and not concentrate on confidentiality or the wishes of the parents. In this case, it is very important to assert as strongly as possible that the child’s interests come first. There is no doubt whatever about the damage that can be done to children either if they accidentally find out that their social father is not their biological father or if circumstances arise where they have to be told. They may take it very hard, whereas they can—with difficulty, I agree, because it is a difficult subject to explain to a child—be brought up in the knowledge that their biological father is not their social father. Therefore, I strongly support the amendment, even if in the end the advice appears not in the Bill but only in the code, although I should prefer to have both.