Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answers by Earl Howe on 26 January (HL4063 and HL4228) and by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Public Health, Jane Ellison, on 2 February (HC222039), whether the dates on which the members of the Expert Panel convened by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) held its meetings were recorded or otherwise indicated by minutes of their discussion meetings published on the HFEA website; how it was confirmed that correspondence regarding the abstract in <i>Fertility and Sterility</i> in 2003 (Volume 30, supplement 3, p56) was shared with other panel members by forwarding of emails or by distributing printed copies in person at discussion meetings; why the HFEA has been unable to determine the exact date on which the Expert Panel first became aware of this abstract; and whether they can indicate the first month and year for which records are available when the Expert Panel discussed correspondence regarding this abstract.

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has advised that it has convened an Expert Panel to review the safety and efficacy of methods to avoid mitochondrial disease through assisted conception on three occasions - in 2011, 2013 and 2014 (plus an addendum to the third review in 2014). The minutes of the Panel’s meetings for the 2011 and 2013 reviews are available on the HFEA website at:

http://www.hfea.gov.uk/6372.html

The minutes of the 2014 review will be on the website shortly. All of the minutes record the dates the Panel’s meetings took place. As outlined in the report of its third review, carried out in 2014, the Panel met three times for this review between February and June 2014, their main meeting being on 4 April 2014.

As outlined in the Panel’s addendum to the third review (a review of the safety and efficacy of polar body transfer to avoid mitochondrial disease) members met twice, on 26 August and 16 September 2014, to discuss this addendum.

As explained in my answer to the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool on 26 January 2015 (HL4063 and HL4228), a member of the Expert Panel corresponded with one of the authors of the abstract referred to in the noble Lord’s question, and the HFEA has advised that this correspondence was shared with the other Panel members. The correspondence was by email. The Expert Panel corresponded about this abstract in September 2014.