Leading cloning entrepreneur revealed as one of Labour Party's dozen secret backers

BY FREDDY GRAY
ONE of the 12 secret backers who bankrolled Tony Blair's last election campaign was a leading cloning entrepreneur, it has emerged.
Prof Sir Christopher Evans, a multi-millionaire who founded the venture capital firm Merlin Biosciences, is reported to have lent the Labour Party £1 million before last May's elections, prompting questions about possible links between the party's funding and the Government's unequivocal support for the cloning of human embryos for research.
Sir Christopher had previously made a number of donations to the Labour Party and was knighted in 2000.
He has since appealed to the Government to invest a further £100 million into cloning. In last December's Budget Chancellor Gordon Brown announced a £50 million increase in stem-cell research funding.
Merlin Biosciences is at the centre of a serious fraud inquiry, but Sir Christopher has denied any wrongdoing. The firm is heavily involved in funding stem-cell research, and is a substantial shareholder in the pharmaceutical company Ardana which, according to its website, enjoys "exclusive rights to commercialise research by the Medical Research Council's (MRC's) Human Reproductive Sciences Unit". The MRC is funded by the taxpayer. In 2000. Mr Blair told the European Bioscience Conference that the Government had spent £600 million on biotechnology and medical research and development. Pro
life groups first raised concerns about the Government's relationship with the biotech industry in 2001, following the unusual haste with which the Government pushed through legislation in favour of human cloning.
In 2001 David Amess, the Conservative MP for for Southend West. asked the Prime Minister for an explanation of the Government's conduct in this area, referring directly to Mr Blair's relationship with Sir Christopher.
The biotech tycoon is believed to have visited the Prime Minister regularly as a member for the Council for Science and Technology, a government advisory body. Leading opponents of cloning are also distressed by the Government's association with several other key figures in the
bio-tech field, such as Sir Ronald Cohen, who was knighted in 2000. Sir Ronald gave £100,000 to the Labour Party before the 1997 General Ejection and chairs Apax Partners Worldwide, a company which has invested in PPL Therapeutics, the biatech firm that cloned the sheep Dolly.
There is no evidence to suggest that Sir Christopher or Sir Ronald's professional interests have not been properly declared.
Other prominent pro-cloning Labour supporters include Lord Sainsbury, who gave £2 million to last year's election campaign. and Lord Winston.
Under Mr Blair, Britain has become, along with South Korea, a leader in human cloning, although the research has not led to the cure of any diseases.