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Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [Lords]

The genetic engineering that I was discussing could happen by the insertion of healthy nuclear genes into a one-celled embryo, the modification of the embryo and the creation of healthy embryos. In other words, one would be selecting genes, inserting them into the nuclear DNA of an embryo and thereby designing the embryo that one requires. That would not only be creating a designer baby; it would create a strong precedent for other types of designer baby in future. All those three controversial procedures are banned under proposed new section 3ZA(2) to (4), but 3ZA(5) and clause 3(6) override those restrictions. Baroness Royall has stated that"““the Government remain firmly committed to a ban on reproductive cloning.””—[Official Report, House of Lords, 3 December 2007; Vol. 696, c. 1513.]" I do not doubt that, but the restriction should be included in primary legislation instead of relying on the word of the Government. The Department of Health itself accepts that the legislation contains a flaw that, in theory, makes it easier for the ban on reproductive cloning to be lifted. The hon. Member for Oxford, West and Abingdon (Dr. Harris), the Liberal Democrat spokesman on science, was reported by Timesonline on 14 June as saying:"““It would be better, for the sake of consistency and reassurance, for the Bill to do what we all thought it would do, which is totally to ban human reproductive cloning in primary legislation.””" I heartily agree with him, and he reinforced that point earlier in the debate. It would have been easy for the Government to have amended the Bill and made a commitment to ban reproductive cloning. If the Government really oppose reproductive cloning, why the loophole?