Mr. Speaker, it is with pride that I rise to speak to Bill C-13. The Government of Canada is providing much needed leadership by putting in place the legislative framework to ensure consistency in the measures governing assisted human reproduction for the one in six couples who have trouble beginning their families.
We hope the bill will finally lay to rest the fact that there have been charlatans, people who have preyed on some of our most vulnerable families in terms of promising them the world and delivering literally nothing.
The bill must go forward so that families trying to have a family can do so knowing that their safety, privacy and health will be taken into consideration, and that it will be conducted in a safe and ethical framework, which is what the bill does.
We must reaffirm the three objectives of the bill: to help couples build a family without compromising their health and safety; to prohibit unacceptable practices, such as human cloning; and to make sure that related research in infertility treatments and serious disease take place within a regulated environment.
It is imperative that all potentially beneficial research take place in a tightly regulated environment which is what the bill would do. The bill places Canada in line with the measures taken in many other industrialized countries. I think it is comprehensive, integrated and draws on the best practices and experiences from countries around the world. It is the result of extensive public consultation across Canada and it reflects a consensus on some of the most complex and challenging issues facing our society.
People must also understand, regardless of what commentaries have been made in the House, that the bill effectively bans cloning. The lack of scientific knowledge reflected in some of the speeches in the House was really upsetting to me. For people in the House to think that the bill does not prohibit unauthorized research on human embryos and that it would allow cloned embryos to be implanted in the embryonic stage and harvested, is just nuts.
The idea that we have parliamentarians talking about creating humans from mitochondria just actually lets us know that they have no idea of science. As I get to the end of my remarks, I want people to understand that it gives me some concerns about the need for a scientific understanding by members of any proposed agency for the conduciveness of the bill in terms of the research.
As a family physician I have always been impressed by the poignancy of the plight of the infertile couple. It is a medical problem, an emotional problem and a social problem but it is one of the few problems where people are told to get over it and forget it. However in my experience as a family physician, people cannot and do not get over it. The desire to have a family that is biologically related is huge. We need to ensure in everything we are doing in terms of progressive legislation that we do not have the unintended consequence of sending people, which is a normal instinct, underground or to the United States.
Ever since the royal commission's results came out I have had serious concerns about using the Criminal Code for issues regarding women and their bodies. I believe the Criminal Code should be used with respect to cloning and the scientists.
However, when it comes to the relationship between a woman, her physician and the specialists dealing with this, I have serious concerns about the donors in this bill. I personally will work on that as the bill goes to the Senate and in its review in three years.
It is interesting that the bill has had such a long gestation. I think Valerie Lawton's comprehensive article in the Toronto Star reminded us that the royal commission's report on reproductive technologies was titled “Proceed with Care”. It has been 10 years since that 1,300 page report resulting from consultations with 40,000 people and only now are we starting to fill that legislative void.
There is no question that the bill has been tough. As Ms. Lawton pointed out in her article, the opinions on the bill are sharply divided. The pro-lifers, the people who have trouble conceiving babies the usual way, children conceived in laboratories, ethicists, fertility doctors, sperm banks, researchers and the people suffering from diseases that could one day be treated or cured because of the research involving embryos, all have very different points of view. Therefore it has been very difficult to proceed in this way, to find effective compromises and a proper legislative framework.
It is important that the research on stem cells continue, both on embryos and on adult stem cells. I do not think one researcher in Canada has told us that we should not move forward vigorously on both files, that we cannot put all of our hopes on adult stem cells when it is very clear that at the present time there is so much promise in the embryonic stem cell lines.
We must continue to remind ourselves, as there has been this big debate around stem cell research, that the bill is actually about helping couples who need help. The bill is about assisted human reproduction. It is about creating a safe and ethical environment for couples having trouble getting pregnant.
It is important that this debate is around embryos that are left over after tormented couples decide they have had enough of an extraordinarily invasive and difficult time with in vitro fertilization, that they will not do any more cycles and there are a couple of eggs left over. It is, therefore, with their consent that they would, in this bill, be allowed to decide whether these embryos will go to the laboratory to be used to find cures for the difficult diseases like juvenile diabetes and muscular dystrophy, or whether that same frozen embryo goes into the basket. It is pretty clear. I think women and their partners have every right to choose whether those frozen embryos go toward saving lives and curing diseases.
As we look at the important parts of the bill and the overall benefits that exist in the bill, I want to comment on some of the issues that I hope will be dealt with in the Senate or at the review stage of the bill. We must realize that legislation such as this has to be made responsive and relevant to the emerging needs. The existence of an agency will help but, with the experience in England, the agency must be able to anticipate and move with the science, it must be able to comment and it must be able to regulate the emerging science.
I am a little concerned at the moment that the makeup of the agency precludes the people that know the most about this area. Patrick Taylor's op-ed piece in the Globe and Mail which says that war is too important to be left to the generals is a very interesting concept. Even members in the House have been so confused by the science. We need to ensure that the people on the agency have the scientific background to be able to interpret the information coming to them. Otherwise they will be at the mercy of the people briefing them when it comes to making those ever important decisions.
The infertile community is worried that the board of the agency could be constituted of people who do not understand what their problems have been. The reality is that a ban of gestational carriers or donors would mean that they would have to either go underground or go to the United States.
It is really important as we move on a registry that we move on the kinds of things that could really help. We must also have people who have had experience with adoption. In that way we can learn from their adoption experience and help couples move forward. There is a need for updated medical information in such a registry. We need the capacity to do this in an open way and in a way that will enable the tracking of genetic information and social information in terms of the offspring of the pregnancies.
I am worried about the word “mandatory” in reference to counselling which is in the bill. As a family physician who did a lot of this kind of counselling, I am worried for the couples who do not have a family doctor. I am worried about the capacity, even in a community like Ottawa, where there are only a couple of psychologists that are available. I am worried that we will pre-empt the ability of couples to get the help they need if we are too strict about the definition of counselling in the bill.
I am concerned in the interpretation that even couples who use their own eggs and/or their own sperm, in the technicality of the bill would be forced to go to counselling, even when the genetic material is their own. I am also concerned that anybody undergoing this sort of procedure in terms of assisted human reproduction would have to register in a registry even if it is their own eggs or their own sperm. I think that is an invasion of their privacy and I hope that will be dealt with in the regulations.
It is extraordinarily important as we move forward that the people for whom this bill is intended, the one couple in eight couples, feel they have been listened to. Some of the toughest moments in my practice have been when I have had to tell someone of a diagnosis that will mean they will never be pregnant, whether it was Turner's syndrome or cancer.
The double whammy of a bad diagnosis plus the inability to ever consider being pregnant cannot be emphasized too much. It is totally underestimated and is a huge secret in terms of the actual torment couples in our country go through. I have to think of when those women realize they are not pregnant again after all they have been through to try to have a pregnancy.
Husbands would sneak into my office without their wives knowing. They wanted me to know how tough it was on their wives, how tough it was on their families and how their wives were not able to function at work in the ongoing difficulty in trying to have their own biological children. It is very easy for people to say, “Get over it. Turn the page. Get on with your life”. That has not been my experience as a family physician.
I think that people who wanted to adopt would have adopted before going through the kinds of procedures that couples are going through, those who have chosen to try to have some sort of pregnancy of their own genetic line. It is not a luxury for these people. It is a medical problem they face. We as Canadians should support this extraordinarily important wish of these couples and help them to become parents and grandparents.
The bill is an important first step. I think it is comprehensive. I think it has done an important job in this legislative void. I think everyone will work to try to make it better both in the Senate and in its review in three years.
I also hope we will get the agency up and running as quickly as possible so that the much needed research is not delayed. I hope as Canadians we will start to have a better understanding of the extraordinarily large part of our society that is having trouble getting pregnant.
I will be proud to vote for the bill. I still hope that one day we can do a better job for the infertile community. I also hope that all members of the House will see how important this is and will get behind it and support the bill.