Danna Vale (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

In addressing the Prohibition of Human Cloning for Reproduction and the Regulation of Human Embryo Research Amendment Bill 2006, I acknowledge that there is a wide range of opinions that are genuinely held by my colleagues on both sides of the House. I have read many of their speeches and I am aware of their various points of view. However, nothing I have heard has persuaded me from voting against this bill, and I welcome this opportunity to state my point of view to the people of Australia—and most especially to my constituents.

The proponents of this bill tell us that it will help scientists to find cures for many serious illnesses, like Parkinson’s or diabetes, despite the fact that to date there is absolutely no scientific evidence to suggest that embryonic stem cells can provide the miracle that many seek. However, on reading the bill, it is clear to me that the core issue of this legislation is far more serious. The defining issue in this bill is how our society will value human life in the future.

As many Australians are aware, a human embryo is a developing human being at its very earliest stages of life. During the embryonic phase, brainwave activity begins, along with the development of a heartbeat and other major organs. The embryo’s unique DNA is present: the three billion detailed instructions needed to build the embryo into a unique person are all present in his or her DNA molecule at the very instant of conception. Whether begun by fertilisation of the ovum by sperm or by somatic cell nuclear transfer—which was the process used to produce Dolly the sheep—the single cell human embryo has all the necessary genetic information to direct its own development as a living human being. The genetic information in the DNA molecule is the most densely packed set of information known in the universe. Science cannot say where this amazingly complex set of three billion instructions came from, but we can say this: if scientists in the 30-year-old search for extraterrestrial life program detected such a complex string of information in radio signals from outer space, they would be convinced that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.

When this legislation was first brought before the House in 2002, all members unanimously voted to reject any suggestion that human embryos could be created for scientific experimentation and then destroyed. My first question is: what has changed in the intervening four years to convince Senator Patterson and other proponents of this amendment that it is necessary and desirable to bring this amendment before the House once again? In the debate of 2002, while the House agreed to allow the use of those frozen embryos that were surplus to the requirements of the IVF program, many members were clear in their opposition to the deliberate creation of human embryos for the purpose of scientific experimentation and subsequent destruction. Even Senator Patterson stated:

I believe strongly that it is wrong to create human embryos solely for research. It is not morally permissible to develop an embryo with the intent of truncating it at an early stage for the benefit of another human being.

I agreed with Senator Patterson’s words on that occasion—and I still do. So what has changed in the intervening four years for the senator to change her mind so diametrically to bring on this amendment in her name? When parliament unanimously decided that all cloning of human embryos would continue to be banned in 2002, this position reflected that of many other countries as well as the United Nations Declaration on Human Cloning, which Australia supports.

Since 2002 there has been no significant scientific advance with human cloning. There has not been a single confirmed case of an effective cure for any disease anywhere in the world through the use of embryonic stem cells. The one allegedly scientific advance that the Lockhart committee used to justify its recommendation to overturn the parliamentary ban of 2002 was the Korean experiment under Professor Hwang, which turned out to be a monumental fraud and a hoax on the scientific community. This failure is also an unethical and cruel deception for those who suffer from illnesses and disease.

The revelation of this fraud must be an embarrassment for those on the Lockhart committee. It certainly presents a fatal difficulty for any logical acceptance of the committee’s report. Parliament cannot be expected to take this report seriously when it is known to be based on fraudulent claims and misrepresentations of fact. As the report is based on bad research, its recommendations must now be regarded as scientifically indefensible. However, the bill is before this House and, while it raises complex issues of an ethical, scientific, societal, medical, philosophic, spiritual and religious nature, I still come to the unavoidable conclusion that this amendment raises a singular defining issue—that is, the value this parliament now places on a human life.

I note that many other issues have been raised and considered by other members in this debate. These issues include the breach of ethical scientific behaviour in holding out false hope to the sick and infirm, the lack of scientific evidence that embryonic stem cells can actually deliver what has been promoted, the practical problems and repellent facts of securing a sufficient harvest in the supply of human eggs, as pointed out by Katrina George of Women’s Forum Australia, and worse, the repugnant provision for human-animal hybrids ‘for the testing of sperm quality’.

This bill presents these difficulties despite the recognition that adult stem cells have been scientifically proven to be the only repair cells upon which we can really rely, as explained by Professor James Sherley of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston.

Other members have already ably argued these and other issues, but I want to address what I see as the core of this debate—that is, how we as a society, as a parliament, as a modern, educated, industrial, self-indulgent, consumer-driven Western society of the 21st century, value human life. For if this legislation is passed, we will have crossed over into another world—a world which devalues human life while at the same time allowing the de facto cloning of human beings to become a distinct possibility. We would be naive to think for one moment that there will never be a scientist somewhere who will be able to resist the temptation to produce Australia’s first cloned baby.

Until this legislation, human life was valued simply because it was just that—a human life. Some refer to the sanctity of human life, because, as we are told in the good book, we are made in the likeness of God. Even if such explanation is not accepted by some, none will deny that each human life is a distinct entity, a being unique in the universe, individuated by its own DNA, singularly vibrant with varying talents, attributes and proclivities, resonant with feeling, brimming with hope and dreams. All together, human life embraces the good, the bad, the ugly and the beautiful.

In 2002, this House duly and rightfully concluded that it was desirable and appropriate that this unique creation be spared the indignity of being reduced to disposable, experimental laboratory material. So, besides the flawed Lockhart report, I again ask: what has changed? I also note that the Lockhart report would have this parliament provide the nation with a statutory definition of when life begins, and they decided that 14 days was a lovely number. At 14 days, under this amendment, the embryo is to be destroyed, as if, for those first 14 days, it wasn’t human at all, but just some kind of property available to be used. So this unscientific report recommends that, after 14 days, the created human embryo is now a life, 14 days after it began.

Of course, there has been quite some debate about when life actually begins, but how can human life begin other than at the time it is conceived—that is, at conception? Human life cannot start without conception, so that must be the time at which life begins. It is certainly the time when the three billion design instructions for making this unique individual come into existence in the embryo’s DNA. Yet this amendment will provide a statutory definition of the beginning of human life at 14 days. So what is it up to that time if it is not human? I have no doubt that it is human.

It is interesting to note that there is also no doubt about its human nature amongst some of the proponents of the objectives of this bill—that, at its very earliest, the embryo is the tiniest member of the human family. In an interview on Lateline on 14 August 2002, Tony Jones was interviewing Professor Alan Trounson, CEO of the National Stem Cell Centre, and Dr David van Gend, spokesman for Do No Harm, an association supporting stem cell research but opposing embryo destruction. During this interview, Dr van Gend said:

The fundamental issue is that, if the embryo matters, there are certain things we cannot do. We cannot define this littlest member of the human family as mere meat for the consumption of science. That is the line we cannot cross.

Tony Jones then asked Alan Trounson: ‘Is it the smallest member of the human family, the embryo?’ Alan Trounson answered: ‘It’s clearly human. We treat it with respect, but we have laws that say we have to destroy it.’ Tony Jones then asked him: ‘Taking the points David van Gend has raised, does that actually bother you ethically if this is a human being?’ Alan Trounson replied: ‘No, it doesn’t bother me at all.’ Dr van Gend went on to say:

... it’s a greater evil to say we will now define a subgroup of the human family as laboratory material. We will say specifically in our laws that now a member of the human race, a genetic member of our family, will be material for science to consume.

That interview was held in 2002. It is now 2006 and we are debating the value which our society places upon human life. Forget the slippery slope. We are now in a headlong dive towards a new world where human life will need to be brave indeed because it will now be seen in terms of its varying utility. This legislation provides for the destruction of human life and the thrust of this bill is that such destruction might one day, despite the absence of any evidence, be of some benefit to somebody else. To reproduce human life in a depersonalised way, in a laboratory, for the purpose of experimentation and then to kill that life is to reduce it to property to be used. This bill is bad because it is clearly about exploitation, and that can never, ever be justified in a civilised society.

Professor Father Frank Brennan of the Australian Catholic University rightly takes issue with the committee’s attempt to differentiate those human embryos created by nuclear transfer as having ‘a different social or relational significance’, and thus could be experimented upon, from those created by fertilisation of eggs by sperm. This is a seismic shift. No longer is the essential humanity of the embryo the test for this committee. For them the new consideration is whether or not the embryo has any social or relational significance. What would be the test and who would decide? Father Frank goes on to point out:

Once we cross the moral contour prohibiting creation of human life only for experimentation and destruction there is no other coherent dividing line to draw.

I understand this to mean that we are then in a moral wilderness—no more ethical principles to guide us; our compasses would be all awry. Indeed, there are many lonely people in the world today who may find themselves without social or relational significance, but in a Lockhart future such people would be seen for the utility they may provide. Thus they are expendable.

From a spiritual point of view I have never put much store in the concept of utilitarianism when dealing with human beings and, as this is a conscious vote, I should really explain why to my constituents. Ironically, the Lockhart committee did note:

... there are certain moral values that are held in common by all communities, such as a commitment to social justice and equity, and to the care of vulnerable members of society.

I say ‘ironically’ because this amendment is set to change those very certain moral values by crossing Father Frank’s moral contour and seeing human beings only on the basis of their utility as disposable laboratory material. Why? Because those moral values identified by the committee are the fruits of the beliefs, faith and values of our fathers and grandfathers from many preceding generations whose beliefs, faith and values were rooted in the teachings of a uniquely love based Christian faith. Such Christian ethics in turn informed our sense of human justice, freedom and equality and thus the establishment of our democratic institutions.

It is from the principles and ethics of the Christian faith that we derive our awe, respect and wonder for human life, simply because it is a human life made in the image of God. Christians do not value human life on the basis of contribution to society or productive capacity or, in other words, on its utility. No doubt there are many in this place and in contemporary Australian society who will sneer at this suggestion. But if they would observe history for a while they might understand how religious beliefs are a key driver in forming the kind of society in which we live. As a person thinks and believes, so that person will act. As governments think and believe, so they will enact laws. As author and thinker Richard Eason has pointed out in his book entitled Playing God:

We all base our reasoning on presuppositions, many of which are beliefs that are non-testable and therefore religious, even if non-theistic. So everyone has a world view based on religious presuppositions even if we cannot consciously identify it.

According to Mr Eason:

... history reveals that some world views provide a sound basis for reasoning to conclusions that match the created reality, while some other beliefs do not. For example, those few nations that have based their legal and constitutional systems on biblical Christianity (the root) can be seen to enjoy a freedom, justice, peace and prosperity (the fruit) that is unique in all of history.

In an age of the globalisation of capital and of pressure for unrestricted movements of goods and people, we neglect the civilising influence of Christian beliefs and values at our peril. We should never forget that it took 16 centuries of suffering and sacrifice for courageous Christians to shackle the power of big government, big religion and big money.

One religion that has produced very bitter fruit is that of secular humanism. It unleashed the French Revolution and has underpinned most other revolutions ever since. And, being a product of modernism, it unduly idolises science. Humanism has also convinced many intelligent people in Australia and in other Western democracies of the fiction that religion and government can be separated. No society has ever been able to separate government and religion. The greatest jurist of the 20th century, Lord Denning, put it this way:

Without religion there can be no morality, and without morality there can be no law.

Another way of putting it is that government is the process of putting someone’s religious beliefs into law. In this context it is therefore time to say that government and religion are inseparable. Hence the most important question facing any nation is to decide which beliefs will ensure that its laws produce justice, freedom, peace and prosperity for its citizens. When the nation changes its values and belief system, its laws and governance will also change.

We in Australia are in grave danger of losing sight of the impact of our Christian heritage on our institutions of governance. We can observe it in this bill. The objective of this bill—the deliberate creation and killing of human embryos—deliberately walks away from the Christian values that informed Australia’s justice, democracy, freedom, peace and prosperity. This bill is distinctly un-Christian. We proceed at our peril into the valley of utilitarianism. If the demands of utilitarianism are henceforth to be the ruling ethic of our future society then all human life and dignity will no longer be protected by the values of the uniquely love based Christian world view.

In a Lockhart future, human beings will be valued according to their usefulness. We will be valued on our economic contribution and on how much we can produce, but when we can no longer be useful, when we are no longer producers—when we become simply consumers and polluters—what then? What then of the aged and the infirm? What then of our commitment to social justice and equity and to the care of vulnerable members of society? We will have changed the ground rules back in December 2006, we will have cut ourselves off from the roots of our Christian based civilisation and we will be left with the bitter fruit of the utility value of humanity.

That is the way it works; if you do not believe me, take a hard look at those societies in the world that cannot claim a history of Christian faith and values. Do you really want to live there? Do they have the same respect for human life as that to which we aspire? Do they share ‘certain moral values ... such as a commitment to social justice and equity, and to the care of vulnerable members of society’? This is the moral vacuum into which we are heading. This is the Rubicon we are about to cross with this ill-conceived legislation. And, as Father Brennan said, there will be ‘no other coherent dividing line to draw’.

The principle of this bill is based on bad ethics. This bill tries to dress up bad science with garlands of empty promises and unfounded hope. No good comes from bad ethics, no good comes from bad science and no good comes from bad legislation. This bill is a try-on. The case for change has not been made. I oppose this bill and reject it for the shibboleth that it is and for the moral bankruptcy that drives it. My family, friends and constituents can look and see my name recorded thus in the Hansard on this day in December 2006.

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