CURES or treatments derived from cloned embryos may not be used by Catholic hospitals in the future, Sydney Auxiliary Bishop Anthony Fisher told a Senate committee hearing on October 20.
Bishop Fisher told the inquiry the Church would maintain its opposition to therapeutic cloning – involving creating a cloned embryo for its stem cells – even if cures or treatments were found through such techniques.
In his opening address to the Senate Community Affairs Committee Inquiry into Legislative Responses to Recommendations of the Lockhart Review, he said Parliament’s decisions on the bills before it will have a profound impact on how human dignity is acknowledged and human life is reverenced in Australia in the future.
A private member’s bill to remove the ban on therapeutic cloning introduced by Liberal Senator Kay Patterson will be voted on in the next few weeks.
Prime Minister John Howard has granted a conscience vote on the issue after his own MPs rebelled against a Cabinet plan to shelve the Lockhart recommendations.
Bishop Fisher said the somewhat truncated Lockhart Inquiry failed to canvass many issues it should have.
He said Senator Patterson’s bill, and a further private member’s bill being introduced by Democrats Senator Natasha Stott-Despoja, risked a similarly truncated discussion.
Meanwhile, Catholic Health Australia chief executive officer Francis Sullivan told the Senate inquiry that in taking forward the Lockhart Committee’s recommendations into legislation, “the Senate will be taking a moral position on the status of the human embryo which effectively undermines the principle of protecting innocent human life”.
