Because of the issues that we are discussing, we have tended to speak about the subject in the most careful tones. However, last month in the Australian Parliament, Senator Derryn Hinch gave an absolutely blistering speech in which he lambasted medical watchdogs and manufacturers for once again letting down women, and compared the scandal of mesh implants to that of thalidomide. I include the MHRA in my criticisms. I know that it is a United Kingdom body, but when the Public Petitions Committee took evidence from it, we learned that its detailed analysis amounted to three postgraduate students doing a desktop exercise for two weeks at a cost of £20,000.

All of us in this Parliament welcomed the Scottish Government’s announcement of a moratorium and many health boards have respected that moratorium. Can we conclude other than that the health boards that have not done so have wilfully acted in a way that has put women’s lives at risk?