Peter Andren (Calare, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

In my contribution to the debate on the Research Involving Embryos and Prohibition of Human Cloning Bill 2002, I stated:

I have come to the conclusion that research into adult stem cells is proving more productive than research involving embryos, and I have grave concerns about the destruction of human embryos whether excess IVF or not.

Nothing in the four years since August 2002, the Lockhart review included, has convinced me or, arguably, any other reasonable and objective observer that this situation has changed. I have closely monitored input from my constituents, and I totally respect the concerns expressed by both sides in this debate on the Prohibition of Human Cloning for Reproduction and the Regulation of Human Embryo Research Amendment Bill 2006. I must say that the overwhelming number of submissions, emails and letters to me on this issue, in almost all cases individual and highly personal accounts, have firmed me in my opposition to this bill.

When you compare the title of the 2002 bill with that of this bill, you see that the not-so-subtle change in this bill to ‘prohibition of cloning for reproduction’ represents a major and disturbing moral shift. It is a shift in definition of when and how life begins and a redefinition, if this bill is passed by parliament, that suits some in the scientific community and no doubt the pharmaceutical community but that I believe fails the test of human dignity, morality and ethic. I say that in all-too-painful awareness of the tragedy of disease that has affected people close and dear to me, some of whom may hold out hope of cure from any research. I believe such hope of cure from embryonic stem cell research has been deliberately talked up while the most promising outcomes have come from adult stem cell research.

In August 2002, I also said that such research using excess IVF embryos:

... is at the edge of cloning. IVF embryos are used for research but not at this stage for human therapy.

We are now being asked to step across that line. I see absolutely no reason to resile from my comments four years ago when I observed:

Some scientists say that making a clone to extract stem cells ... is different and therefore more acceptable from making a clone to grow a baby.

But in the case of therapeutic cloning there is no denying, even to the degree allowed by this bill, that the embryo—a human—could and would be created for the specific purpose of pulling it apart. I cannot accept that, particularly when adult stem cell research is showing that non-rejectable stem cells from the patient’s own body are delivering promising research outcomes with none of the accompanying ethical and moral dangers.

Again I noted in 2002 that discussions with scientists such as Professor William Hurlbut of Stanford University, whose son has oxygen-denied brain damage, satisfied me that the destructive use of embryos is not necessary to search for cures. It is misrepresentation to suggest that in rejecting this legislation we are condemning people to a lack of hope and treatment and our scientific endeavour to the global backwaters. Parallels have been drawn in this debate between embryonic stem cell research and transplant surgery. The differences are stark and bear no consideration in this debate. This is about creating life in order to dismantle it. It is totally different from even the use of excess IVF embryos for stem cell research.

We have been told not to hold back through fear of the unknown. I am not about to cross that line. We have been told to place blind faith in scientists—for instance, to have no doubts about the safety of burying high-level nuclear waste—but the scientists and their research supporters are human like us, and that goes to their ethics as well. Let me quote from a letter that most parliamentarians would have received from a man who lives in Canberra. He is about to graduate with a PhD in medical sciences and is in partial remission from hairy cell leukaemia. He rejects the half promises and claims of those who would promote embryonic cell research as an answer to his or other people’s disabilities. He says:

... by allowing the manufacture of human embryos for the specific purpose of destroying them for research, we will have enshrined the ethical principle that is permissible to kill one human being in order to treat others.

The potential breakthroughs in stem cell research revolve around adult stem cells. We have seen recent advances involving adult stem cells: scientists are growing human heart valves using stem cells from the fluid that cushions babies in the womb; adult stem cells offering hope in the battle against type 2 diabetes were recently shown in a Louisiana experiment to increase insulin production in mice and to aid kidney repair; British scientists have developed a tiny liver from adult stem cells, as announced early this month; and breast tissue grown from adult stem cells has improved the process of breast reconstruction surgery.

On the contrary side, there is a distinct lack of scientific evidence and of clinical trial results showing any provable outcomes from embryonic stem cell research. In fact, there are continuing dangers from cancer formation, while Korean research that backs some recommendations of the Lockhart review was exposed as fraudulent. This legislation crosses the Rubicon by allowing the creation of cloned human life for the purposes of experimentation, and there is the distinct likelihood of women being exploited for the many thousands of human eggs required for this embryonic stem cell incubator.

By redefining just what is a human embryo this legislation places the first stage of human life, the zygote, outside our ethical and legal responsibility. The Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney, in its submission to the Senate inquiry on this bill, pointed out that in 2002 this parliament banned the creation of human embryos for the purpose of research or therapy—a decision made without a dissenting voice. We all should ask what has changed to make the Senate vote so narrowly now in support of such research. The submission hits the nail on the head: ‘Cloning is never genuinely therapeutic if it results in the destruction of a living human being so created.’ This is to be achieved by shifting the definition of a living human being, moving the goalposts, so to speak, to facilitate the research imperative—research for research’s sake—when the adult stem cell route is available, ethical and providing results.

Griffith University research in Queensland has shown that adult stem cells from human olfactory mucus are able to give rise to new nerve, liver, heart, kidney and muscle cells. The principal researcher, Professor Alan Mackay-Sim, says that the new research ‘turns on its head’ the argument that adult stem cells would not be as useful as embryonic stem cells for cell therapies. In an article for ON LINE opinion, prominent Toowoomba doctor and opponent of embryonic stem cell research David van Gend stated:

Cloning human embryos for research will perfect the technique needed for cloning babies and for growing cloned fetuses for their organs.

…            …            …

So by the time the next review of our cloning laws takes place, and scientists come asking for live-birth cloning and fetal farming, we may not care.

Let me finish by returning to my speech of 27 August 2002, when this parliament decided overwhelmingly not to go down the path this new legislation now takes us just four years on. I said:

I do not know when the soul, spirit or essential humanity enters the being, but if we need conception to begin the life path then, ipso facto, it is then that life begins. We have reached a point in our human development where science dictates—where the vast majority of we lay people are basically forced to trust the scientist because he or she knows best.

Mine is not a Christian position, but it is certainly a spiritual one. Scientists are divided on this issue. Whom do we trust? I trust my instinct, and I note the words of one scientist whom I might be prepared to trust: Dr Peter McCullagh, of Sydney University, who quoted the late Michael Polanyi, Professor of Chemistry at Manchester University, who said:

In the days when an idea could be silenced by showing that it was contrary to religion, theology was the greatest single source of fallacies. Today, when any human thought can be discredited as unscientific, the power exercised previously by theology has passed over to science; hence science has become the greatest single source of error.

Those words also have a chilling relevance to the advocacy of nuclear technology when scientists have yet to find a way of managing the waste or other dangers of the monster their profession has unleashed. In rejecting this bill I urge us all to follow the only ethical path—that of continued adult stem cell research. As I said last time, why don’t we free up the many millions of dollars to be spent on this ethically indefensible research and redirect it to improve the living conditions of those hundreds of millions of people around the world who will never enjoy the benefits of Western medical research and who are battling diseases long controlled in the West, on top of poverty and the exploitation of their labour and resources? I strongly reject this legislation.

See this speech in context