As a surgeon, the noble Lord knows that millions of dollars have sometimes been spent on research into various aspects of conventional medicine. He will remember that millions of dollars were spent on trying to discover whether, after a stroke, an intracranial-extracranial bypass made any difference. Many surgeons believed that it did, but after five years of investigation it was shown that that procedure, which is no longer performed, was ineffective. Those lessons from conventional medicine need to be taken on board as the whole field of complementary medicine is studied. Finally, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Burlison, for pointing out one important aspect of our report that I did not stress before.
Herbal medicine needs closer regulation.
We recommend that it should become regulated under the Health Act. The Government have confirmed that. The important point is that herbal remedies can never achieve the same standard of safety and regulation as is necessary in standard pharmacology, but under the European directive they require much closer and more effective regulation than exists at present. We are glad that the Government have confirmed that view. We are particularly grateful to the Government for their positive response to our recommendations.