The proposal to fund embryonic stem cell research is an area into which the EU should never have entered. All member states are being asked to pay for it and quite a number have laws against it in their own countries. The European Parliament Committee on Legal Affairs passed a resolution making the moratorium on embryonic stem cell research permanent and stipulating that no research forbidden in any member state should be supported by EU funding, but that nations should be free to carry out research using their own funds. This was a fair proposal of freedom of conscience, not coercing any nation to fund something to which it objected.