WEDNESDAY 10 MAY 2000

PROFESSOR MICHAEL WILSON, MR PETER SIDDALL AND MR DAVID TEMPERLEY

  180. You need primary legislation to achieve that status, and we have got to be clear about that.
  (Mr Siddall) That is right.

  181. So does that give you an ultimate safety belt?
  (Professor Wilson) That MAFF is the lender of last resort?

  182. Yes, because they cannot let you flop, can they?
  (Mr Siddall) We hope not. We certainly look at them in that way.

  183. In terms of your organic work, that is separate from your-GM-related biotechnology or is the science overlapping?
  (Professor Wilson) Actually the science could be very usefully overlapping, and I am speaking as a scientist now. This is one of the unfortunate incompatibilities which has been generated by edict rather than scientific rationale. In fact when you are doing research, and you are not marketing or selling the product, then I would contend that GM crops with GM signals in them and bells and whistles that will tell you what is going on and what the crop is experiencing. Those grown under organic regimes would be very interesting crops to look at. Okay, they may not be technically "organic", but I think at the research level there are some interesting technical cross-fertilisations there (in the non-pollen meaning of the word), but I think that as honest brokers, we have to do sound science and rigorous science, properly controlled, on both systems and compare and contrast them side by side.

  184. Gentlemen, thank you very much. You are, I think, producing a revised draft corporate plan, are you not?
  (Professor Wilson) We are indeed.

  185. So we would be grateful to have sight of that. We are also doing an inquiry into the organic sector and we have in fact invited you to give us some written evidence, so we will look forward to that with particular interest because we rather agree with you that GM and organics are both forms of agriculture and neither of them is subject to particular demonology or has biblical virtues and we should start treating them both as commercial activities, but that is a Chairman's remark which is often subject to the approval of the Committee. Gentlemen, thank you very much indeed. We have had an extremely good session. We may want to take up with MAFF some of the issues you have raised with us to get their reactions because I think we have been very interested in some of the points you have made, particularly about your status, the status of the site and that sort of thing, so we will certainly want to take those up. We are very grateful for your coming. I think we have had a very good session indeed and I hope that you feel that it has given you a chance to ventilate your aspirations for the organisation and we hope that you can now retire and have a good drink before lunch!
  (Professor Wilson) Thank you very much, Chairman. I am delighted on behalf of my colleagues at HRI to have had this opportunity not only for your interest to be invested in HRI, but to have had this opportunity to communicate with you. Thank you very much.