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Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [HL]

Sorry, my Lords; I have given way once already. I speak from a rather unique position. In moving the amendment, the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, spoke with the experience of being chairman of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, spoke from her experience on the Bench. I first specialised in infertility care some 35 years ago. My chair, when it was eventually established, was the first in Britain devoted to infertility, and for 35 years of my time professionally, until I retired from the National Health Service, I sat daily in front of infertile women and men—most of the time, listening. My appointments did not last for just five, 10, 15 or 20 minutes. It would be rare for me not to listen to a couple for at least half an hour, and that was true right up to the time of my last clinic. In those consultations, what I saw at first hand, again and again, was something which your Lordships cannot have seen in quite the same way. I saw the pain, the lack of self-esteem, the sense of total failure, the sense of deep bereavement, the anger that these women in particular felt, the despair they showed and the depression they frequently had. Your Lordships, as a House, are asking me, as a doctor, to make a judgment in a situation like that as to who is a suitable parent. You are trying to enforce the unenforceable. This is not a practical proposition.