Symposium on Bill C-13: The Assisted Human Reproduction Act

Introduction On September 21, 2002, Health Law Institute and University of Alberta's Stem Cell Task Force sponsored a Symposium on Bill C-56: The Assisted Human Reproduction Act. (1) We brought together scholars from across Canada and from a variety of disciplines to analyse various aspects of Bill. (2) Most of participants wrote and presented short papers that were then critiqued by their workshop colleagues. Comments in hand, papers were revised and re-submitted. This special edition of Health Law Review contains these papers. (3) Major Themes Though development of group consensus was not an explicit goal of meeting, a number of broad themes emerged. (4) First, we all agreed that purpose of and justifications for legislation need further clarification. Whether one favours use of statutory prohibitions or, alternatively, flexible regulations, Government should provide details on: how adopted regulatory scheme relates to generally accepted Canadian values and views; and why adopted regulatory approach is required. Admittedly, Report of Standing Committee on Health, Assisted Human Reproduction: Building Families, is only government document that relates directly to this Bill. However, we also drew on Health Canada documentation that accompanied 2001 Proposal for Legislation Governing Assisted Human Reproduction. This is not to say that we all disagreed with every conclusion presented in these documents. However, as discussed further in papers that follow, a coherent, comprehensive, and sustainabl e legislative policy remains absent. To cite just a few examples, though we differed on how best to regulate area, all agreed that available formal justifications for statutory bans on non-reproductive cloning (therapeutic) and creation of chimeras were inadequate. Indeed, we are unaware of any formal documentation or, even, formal Government statements on proposed ban on creations of chimeras. How and why do use of these technologies infringe human dignity and other core values? Why is a statutory ban needed to achieve objectives of legislation? Without further clarification, we all felt that long term value and practical and just application of legislation may be in jeopardy (and some of us felt that even its constitutional validity may be in question). Given significant amount of time and political energy that has already been invested in this area, this is a profoundly disappointing state of affairs. A second theme that emerged throughout day was concern about various definitions found in Bill. Though we understand that legal and scientific definitions often differ, Government needs to be sensitive to practical and philosophical implications of selected definitions. For example, definition of chimera is much narrower than accepted scientific understanding of chimera. Why was this definition adopted and what is reason for regulating only a small area of chimeric work? As noted by one workshop participant, the Government needs to decide and communicate what work it wants definition to do. Moreover, in addition to clarifying scope and purpose of definitions created by legislation, Parliament must also strive to frame them in plain language. This will enable these definitions to be readily understood and interpreted by legal and scientific communities and by Canadian public. Finally, we all felt Government has greatly underplayed complexity of public opinion. …

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