Thirteenth visit by the police

Last night at 8.20pm we had yet another visit from the Bishopsgate City of London police at the porch we sleep in at night. I suppose that after being visited so many times (we’ve been sleeping in this particular porch since being made rough sleepers on 3 November 2006), we have a knack for it and can take their questioning this way and that way – well, Declan does most of the talking. In the past, we have been questioned twice by two police officers on horses, by a police officer that was mainly concerned about our welfare, by female police officers, etc.

This time, however, it was quite close to Samuel L Jackson’s S.W.A.T. squad (without a Colin Farrell): five police officers came out of a big police van that had just parked across the road and made their way straight for us. Anyway, Declan was drilled with the usual questions, except this time they wanted to know why didn’t we want to return to Ireland. Declan’s answer was that we are European citizens and waiting for relief from the European Court of Human Rights. British police have a bit of a reputation for being institutionally racist – the one that suggested we leave the UK was from the Middle East though – so we are not taking it personally.

You have to be caught begging to be arrested which is why Declan had no trouble informing them that, as a result of The Big Issue not sorting out the problems we are having on our pitches, we are being forced to beg for money (it seems The Sun tabloid newspaper has completely taken over my pitch after 11.00am, which means I can only step in to sell the Big Issue to passers-by between 7.30am and 9.15am – I say 9.15am because after 9.10am the morning rush hour dies and things don’t pick up again until well past midday). Declan did tell them that twice we have had £350 for the deposit The Big Issue requested of Declan to find us a place to live.

I don’t know which is worse: to be hungry or cold. I am quite used now to going to sleep quite hungry and, although it is not something I welcome with open arms, it has given me a sharp edge which I appreciate: I wrote the draft of Declan’s application of 8 September to the European Court and the urgent request for expedition that went with it – as early as 5.00am and sometimes until 11.00pm – and now I am going full-on to see what NAC could do in embryonic stem cell research, for private funding. So I am very much hoping that the cold won’t work against me. There is another reason why I am cold though. On 11 April I was forced to ask the nun in charge of clothes in the Sisters of Mercy-run Dellow Centre for a pair of jeans and really I am not looking forward to asking her again for clothes, this time for the winter. The Methodist Church-run Whitechapel Mission didn’t give me much either and it’s of course rather unsurprising that on 18 June we were barred from its premises, albeit because the minister’s wife was concerned about our safety.

Back to embryonic stem cell research, there was an article yesterday in The Guardian stating that according to the new head of the Medical Research Council, the UK is in danger of losing its leading position in stem cell research if the next US president relaxes federal restrictions on funding imposed by President Bush. Apparently Bush's policy on embryonic stem cell research looks unlikely to survive long after his political demise because the leading Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were both involved in trying to steer a bill liberalising stem cell research through the senate this year and Republican candidates John McCain and Rudolph Giuliani are both in favour – although in Mr Giuliani's case with reservations. One of the principal arguments of those who oppose the research is that life begins at conception, and, in effect, any embryonic cell is sacred.

The science is very complex, but the bottom line is that embryonic stem cells are what is called "pluripotent" – in that they can potentially be tweaked to form any cell structure in the human body from lung tissue to epidermal tissue or heart muscles. Adult stem cells can (mostly) only reproduce their existing form.

In Australia, the legislation – the Research Involving Human Embryos and Prohibition of Human Cloning Amendment Bill – is due to be debated within weeks, with the sitting beginning on October 9. Meanwhile, the Australian Christian Lobby – trenchantly opposed to the Bill – has directly lobbied all but a handful of state MPs.

In July 2006, the European Union agreed to allow funding for human embryonic stem cell experiments after member states compromised on the way the research is financed – Germany, which had led opposition, agreed to the compromise after a five-and-a-half hour debate while Poland, Austria, Slovakia, Lithuania and Malta maintained their rejection but lacked the votes to block it. The compromise will prevent scientists using EU cash to extract stem cells from human embryos, although they will be able to work on new embryonic cells from national and other sources.

On 22 December 2006 the Secretary General of the Commission of the Bishops' Conferences of the European Community (COMECE) stated: “We continue to insist that the EU should concentrate its joint research efforts on research areas which do not violate deeply held convictions about the inviolability of human life. We are at a loss to understand why the European institutions insisted on allowing EU-funding for very contentious research involving the instrumentalisation of human embryos. We recall our fundamental ethical and anthropological concern regarding the pursuit of such research.”

Perhaps the final word, though, belongs to Michael O'Neill, a 21-year-old Business and Health Science student at the Queensland University of Technology suffering from cystic fibrosis, who says that those who oppose this new frontier of research "don't understand what's involved, they are not the ones sitting here in this hospital bed".