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Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [Lords]

I am grateful for that information; the record has been put straight, and I will not go there. We also took evidence from a lot of specialists and academics in this area. One of the most interesting evidence sessions involved academics from Oxford, Cambridge and elsewhere. Professor Ann Buchanan of Oxford university was asked about the need for a father. She said that"““the evidence for the roles of fathers is important,””" and that she and her colleagues had conducted two major studies which show that father involvement"““is strongly related to children's later educational attainment. Children with involved fathers are less likely to be in trouble with the police. Father involvement is associated with good parent-child relationships in adolescence. Father involvement protects against adult experiences of welfare and later mental health problems and it applies in different ways to both girls and boys””." That was pretty convincing, so we then listened on the same day to Professor Susan Golombok, from Cambridge. When asked about the need for a father, she said:"““In a way, it is common sense…so that fathers who are highly involved with their children, are emotionally available to their children, warm to their children and also exert a reasonable level of discipline have better adjusted children. These children also do better at school and they have better relationships with peers and so it spreads out into their wider social circles. The other side of that coin is that in families where fathers are not very involved or who are anti-social in their behaviour, who are not good parents—begging the question of what that means—the outcomes for their children can be negative. Really, it all comes down to the quality of parenting offered by fathers which makes a difference to outcomes for children.””" That was pretty clear, but on Second Reading—