A former patron of the Progress Educational Trust (PET), which publishes BioNews, has been appointed to the UK's House of Lords. Former UK Member of Parliament (MP) Dafydd Wigley campaigned for the first Human Fertilisation and Embryology (HFE) Act in 1990. He was one of three parliamentarians active in the Progress Campaign for Research into Human Reproduction - the precursor to PET.
Two of Mr Wigley's four children suffered severe genetic disease, which fuelled his interest in appropriately-regulated research into reproductive technologies like PGD (preimplantation genetic diagnosis). He was an advisor to PET in its early days while he was MP for Caernarfon in Wales. Later, he became a full-time member of the Welsh Assembly and a patron of PET.
Mr Wigley has been described as 'a great campaigner and a great parliamentarian'. Professor Marcus Pembrey, PET's Founding Chair of Trustees and an Emeritus Professor at University College London said: 'Dafydd, together with the late Jo Richardson and Peter Thurnham, was a key parliamentarian during the Progress Campaign leading up to the first HFE Act. Thereafter Dafydd was a staunch supporter of the PET'.
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