Chris Hayes (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

ES (—) (): I want to indicate my support for the amendment. I thank everybody who's participated in this debate. I think it's been held and conducted in a way that brings great credit to this House. I, like many, was very disappointed, at the outset of the whole debate on mitochondrial donation, to be simply advised that we can't get any information about the progress of this research that has been going on since 2015 in the United Kingdom. We're prevented from having any access to that on privacy grounds. That means that we must now start from ground zero in starting to look at all these issues.

It takes me back a little bit. Those of us who were around the House in 2006 will remember that we had the therapeutic cloning legislation being debated here. The big aspect then—and there was a lot of hype, I must say, associated with it—was the demand for embryonic stem cell research. All of these potential benefits were being discussed pretty openly by politicians—that's what we are—and not necessarily by all the researchers, other than those who ran the various research laboratories. Some laboratories specialise in embryonic stem cell research, while others specialise in adult stem cell research. Since 2006, the great gains for humanity have come out of the adult stem cell research. Does that mean we're setting up research facilities just to experiment to see what happens? Surely, if the UK were making progress, there would be something that we would know about it. I know that a lot of our research scientists are getting very excited about these techniques.

The other thing I wanted to say is that what I said about embryos in 2006 is that embryos should be afforded the same respect from the moment of creation, regardless of the method, intention and age. I've got to say that remains my position now, but my position could be internally challenged on my part if it could be shown that there are overwhelming benefits to humanity. Yet there's no information out there, so there's no justification for saying there's an overwhelming benefit to humanity. We're just going to see what happens. To me, it's a bridge too far. I didn't like the media reporting of my views on this. The reporting referred to me as a Catholic, which I am, but I took great pains not to take briefings from the church or from other vested interests, although I must admit I spent a lot of time with Mike Freelander, a good friend of mine, who explained to me a fair bit about it, because he has treated children who had mitochondrial disorders. But I thought: 'This is a conscience vote. This has to be what you really believe.' My personal view, and my strong belief, is that simply conducting research on the basis that you will destroy human embryos in the process is a bridge too far.

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