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Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [HL]

My Lords, I agree with the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, that there is a chance that quite soon opinion will change on this matter, where it has not yet changed. It is extraordinary how quickly children have taken to the knowledge of who their genetic parents were when they have been adopted. About 30 years ago a goddaughter of mine, a German child, told me when she was three that a lot of people are brought by the stalks but she came in a train. A year or two later she was explaining to me about what it was to be adopted and how it worked. She knew who her genetic parents were. That has happened quickly; at that time it was quite new for children to talk like that; now it is completely taken for granted. Before long this will happen in the case of donor-conceived children. I too support the amendment. It is a slightly ginger amendment. It is not taking us terribly far but it is keeping the door open. That is perhaps the best we can do.