Kay Patterson (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have noted the issues that have been raised by Senator Stott Despoja, by ACCESS and by the Fertility Society of Australia. It has been commented that this bill purports to regulate all uses of human eggs. I think this concern has arisen from a misunderstanding of the operation of the bill. This bill does not regulate human eggs per se; rather, it regulates those activities detailed in the Lockhart report—that is, eggs being used for SCNT and research involving eggs and sperm up to the first mitotic division. So references to eggs throughout the bill are only to ensure that, where an egg and sperm are used, up to the first cell division, all the normal licensing conditions also apply to that. Licensing conditions apply to an embryo but not to an egg, and, under the bill, an egg is an egg until the first mitotic division. So this definition was placed in the bill to make sure all the consent arrangements for eggs used in SCNT and research involving egg and sperm up to the first mitotic division apply to the use of an egg. It does not regulate the use of eggs in normal ART; it does not change the current situation for the use of eggs in ART. It is for the two changes that were brought about as a result of the Lockhart report. Before the 2002 legislation, the ART institutions were able to test sperm on an egg up to the first mitotic division. One of the unintended consequences of the 2002 legislation was that they were no longer able to do that. They put a case that that is important in fertility treatment. Eggs are used in SCNT—which was not in the previous bill—and therefore they were not covered. I think everyone would agree that appropriate and proper consent should cover the use of eggs in both those cases, and that is what this definition is meant to do.

I apologise to ACCESS and the Fertility Society of Australia. They did put in a submission. I should have responded to explain why that definition was there. Maybe I did not quite see clearly that point in their submission. As I said, their concern has arisen from a misunderstanding. That is why this definition is there; it is not from some sort of Machiavellian motive. It was to address the issue in the Lockhart report but to make sure we had proper consent.