I unfortunately received an email back from one of the members of the upper house, attached with her argument as to why she will be supporting the change.
I noticed she mentioned parkinson’ as one of the things stem cell research would solve but I thought I heard that was false and parkinson’ is not a disease that could be fixed?

Hi michael,

If you have credible information that rebutts any arguments then why not writea short reply referencing your source?

If you can’t remember where you heard it, try looking it up.

There have been a lot of things said that are incorrect,
and many which raise ‘pie in the sky’ hopes (and they call it science).

For me, ONE OF the fundamental issues I have argued is that this Bill relies on an abundant supply of human eggs. There simply will not be enough from their expected sources (eg IVF/ART, altruistic). This assumption just demonstrates ignorance, and will most certainly lead to relaxing the safeguards in the current Bill to allow for ‘valuable consideration’ as in the UK. (see also Egg Donor Abuse Fears elsewhere on this site).

Mike

I’m sorry that I seem to be dominating this forum, but more info at hand:

I spoke today to the office of one of the LC members
who informed me that last Tuesday they held an informal vote on the matter.

Based on this informal vote, the Bill would be passed, but only by 2 votes.

It is close. Certainly closer than I expected.

Members can still change their minds either way for the vote. And members can abstain too. Apparently there is one member who has spoken against the bill and is thinking of abstaining. 

We can still write to members before the vote which is expected to be sometime next Tuesday 26th. Whether they read them is another matter.

You could always write to those who spoke against the Bill and thank them for making a stand on this matter.

According to my info
Those who spoke against the Cloning Bill were:
Mick Gallacher
Gordon Moyes
Tony Kelly
Trevor Kahn (BUT says at the end that he is still making up his mind)
Matthew Mason-Cox
Marie Ficarra
Greg Donnelly
Richard Colless
Fred Nile
David Clarke
Charlie Lynn
John Della-Bosca ( I think this is what he means when he
said he was “drawing a line” he wasn’t clear)
John Ajaka

I didn’t hear all their speeches, they started debating on Tuesday afternoon. I heard from Marie Ficarra onward on Wed.

Members I don’t know where they stand are:
Michael Costa
Amanda Fazio
Kayee Griffin
Don Harwin
John Hatzistergos
Eddie Obeid
Gregory Pearce
Christine Robertson
Eric Roozendaal
Roy Smith
Ian West

Those who spoke in support of Cloning are:
Ian Macdonald
Robert Brown
Robyn Parker
Sylvia Hale
Tony Catanzariti
Lee Rhiannon
John Kaye
Melinda Pavey
Linda Voltz
Peter Primrose
Ian Cohen
Catherine Cusack
Henry Tsang
Jenny Gardiner
Duncan Gay
Helen Westwood
Mick Veitch
Penny Sharpe

Cheers,
Mike

Mike Keith - 21 June 2007 11:11 PM

I’m sorry that I seem to be dominating this forum, but more info at hand:

Don’t apologize, Mike! This is useful and timely information, and helps us to focus our prayers and our writing for the next few days.

Thanks Gordon,

For those who want to read the speeches you can trawl through the days business at the following links:

For Tuesdays debate:
http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/hanstrans.nsf/v3ByKey/LC20070619

For Wednesdays debate:
http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/hanstrans.nsf/v3ByKey/LC20070620

(I’m sorry if the links don’t work by clicking on them, try cutting and paste into your browser, or Go to the NSW Upper House website and search for the Hansard papers for both 19/6 and 20/6 - and go to the full day’s transcript). Someone might try to tell me how to get one of those LINK things going - they’re cool.

Mike

Tuesday
Wednesday

It’s interesting that the votes are so close. Thanks for the recap. Will have to do some more writing.

Also - I thought it might have been Alzeimers that they wouldn’t be able to help with, but I could be quite wrong there. However, I also thought that Parkinsons was one of the areas they might have had some hope in with Adult Stem Cell research. Also just from memory though.

NSW Upper House lifts ban on human cloning and other prohibited practices

Sad.

More reason for prayer!

Why so little press coverage I wonder?

Maybe it’s in its early stages and we’ll see/hear more on it later.