Emily Graves spoke with Josephine Quintavalle about the controversial Government proposal

Indisputably life begins at conception. You can argue that you don't attribute as much value to an early embryo as you might to a 6-month-old baby and that's to be disputed; but what cannot be disputed in any shape or form is that life begins at conception and, if anything, IVF has underlined that. When they're making embryos in test tubes, until you put the sperm and the egg together you do not have a human embryo; when you put them together you do have a human embryo. It is the beginning of life. It's sad that in our country we have very little respect for it.

Under law the early human embryo has a special status for ten, twelve days, but this campaign across Europe is trying to change that. I would urge people to go online and support the campaign. It just asks you to vote to reinforce the statement that the human embryo is one of us. What this campaign in Europe is trying to achieve is to get enough signatures to have it debated at European level and to prohibit any destructive exploitation of the human embryo.

The idea that we would think it's a good idea to create embryos in this abnormal way using material from extra-maternal sources, it's frightening. As I say, many, many secular ethicists are up in arms about it and they talk about germline modification changing things that would pass on to subsequent generations, which would of course also open the possibility of creating not just an embryo without disease but trying to create a better one, manipulating genes so that you took some genes from somebody who's very good at music and some genes from somebody who runs fast etc. You're moving from this kind of approach to positive eugenics: trying to get a better child. There are plenty of statements being made internationally about why you have a duty to enhance your child now. There's also that idea that's coming into play where we have to absolutely reinforce that we're all equal: no matter what disability that people may have, we're all equal. The other thing is that we need to find cures for mitochondrial disease that are available for everybody and don't present these kinds of risks.

Emily: Potentially in 2015 there could be the start of these three-gene babies.

Josephine: It's always worth looking at some of the big battles that have gone on in the United Kingdom over the last years and I was reflecting on the last time when we were making a lot of noise. First it was cloning, but then it was animal-human cloning. The questions need to be asked, did the animal-human cloning that was permitted in the United Kingdom achieve anything? And the answer is no. We were promised the earth and then some; all kinds of wonderful things were going to happen if it would be permitted to combine human sperm with animal eggs. That was the last horror that we were all up in arms about. It is worth after some years, when there have been big battles about these kinds of procedures, to say, and then what happens? And nothing happened. It didn't take us anywhere. All it did was draw the spotlight on the United Kingdom as the country where anything goes. The country that never says no, which the United Kingdom is quite proud of, but they should be ashamed of. Sometimes the greatest wisdom is when you don't eat the apple and that's the message that we've got through our Christian backgrounds, saying no, sometimes that is the biggest wisdom.

Emily: So what are the next steps for the Government?

Josephine: It's not particularly clear what would be the next step in terms of how much political opposition can be raised against it, but it's really a question of getting the regulations in place. The possibility of doing this was tagged on to human fertilisation-embryology legislation already, so there's an opening there where it could get through quite quickly, but it would have to be subject to regulations. At this stage it's not very clear what kind of opposition could be mounted against it, but certainly opposition from Europe is a very important issue and there is at the Council of Europe a declaration that's circulating and being signed amongst the 47 or 48 countries involved in opposing this kind of manipulation of the human embryo. It's about getting the other European countries to put the spotlight on the United Kingdom and say, we admire you for lots of things, but for this, I'm sorry, it's thumbs down.

Emily: Won't there also be an issue with all three sets of parents having the rights to the child?

Josephine: Well, thank you, I hadn't actually thought about that. When egg donation is involved and sperm donation, there are big discussions as to who's who and who's what. But I think here, though, the argument is it's such a tiny amount of genetic material from the third party that it doesn't really matter. But then you have to turn round and say, well it is such an important part. You know, you're presenting it as a life-saving intervention, so obviously it may not be a large quantity but it's very important. The principle is always once you cross the slope, you slip down; you don't climb back up again. The slippery slope in ethics is about down, down, down.

Emily: What does the Bible say about life in general?

Josephine: In relationship to this? Well, I think biblically God created man and woman. It's pretty simple. Also there is that concept of not to eat of the forbidden fruit. I think we do have to understand that the gift of life is very precious and it's not for us to, in any way, decide that one human being is better than another. Equality is what it's all about, so just yesterday on one of the BBC shows there was a discussion on abortion for disability and this is frightening because we've got this whole concept of quality; the perfect; even though we couldn't make enough noise about how wonderful the Paralympics were. We've got to do some joined-up writing here. If we love the Paralympians, is it just simply because they're more athletic than most of us? You know, I know a disabled person who said, "I don't want to have to be jumping over hurdles to be loved; I want to be able to sit on a couch and be a couch potato like everybody else."

Emily: That's a good way of putting it!

Josephine: That's important too. We've now created the idea of the good disabled person. Everybody knows somebody who's very talented, or who's got some condition or other. We have to see equality as no matter what, we are all equal, whether we're severely disabled, deeply unattractive, not very clever, or whatever: we're all made in God's likeness.

Emily: What is your prayer for this time for Britain?