Life and Death

On the very day many people were remembering the Battle of Britain, fought to save the freedom of our people, the Commons forced through the most intolerant and illiberal Bill I have seen in my 21 years in Parliament. Unsurprisingly, the Chamber was invaded by ‘strangers’ for the first time since King Charles I strutted in.

A major motivation for my decision to stand for Parliament was the imperative to protect minorities from the tyranny of the majority. Remember the Nazis? They were elected. No, if the majority always had its way we’d still have public executions and no tax.

I have never hunted foxes in my life – but from childhood in Salisbury I have supported the right, in a tolerant and mature democracy, for country folk to continue an ancient and useful tradition that is part of our heritage and for which there is no obviously better substitute.

Foxes will continue to be killed – but now they will be killed with greater risk of cruelty. Our nation will be a more boring, more self-righteous and less colourful place. I doubt that what is left of the House of Lords will have much influence on events. We are heading for an elective dictatorship in which government police will stand, armed, in the very Chamber of our democracy. I’d rather have an invasion by passionate demonstrators, misguided though they were, than the armed police who failed to stop them getting in. Shame on our Government.

Before I addressed the largely peaceful demonstrators in Parliament Square (amongst whom were scores of people from South Wiltshire) I had spent the morning discussing life and death in the Science and Technology Select Committee. We are reviewing the working of the law relating to human embryos. We have taken evidence from scientists, ethicists, parents of children with genetic disabilities – and now it was the turn of Christian churches and those opposed to intervention.

I regret to report that with the honourable exception of the Bishop of Rochester, this was a display of intolerance as great as that being opposed outside in Parliament Square. Within a decade, parents will be able to identify those genes in their embryos that will give rise not just to life-threatening disabilities in their children, but also to height, shape, baldness, propensity to intellect, sport, music and other talents. Mankind is on the threshold of new opportunities – and new risks.

We cannot disinvent genetics. But just because we can do something, it doesn’t mean we should. On your behalf, I am trying to help Parliament decide where we should draw the line. Now that is what Parliament is for.