The Prime Minister risks denting his popularity even further if he forces through measures to liberalise embryo research without allowing more time for MPs and the electorate to debate the moral issues at stake, according to a new poll today (May 13).

A survey commissioned by the group Comment on Reproductive Ethics shows that nearly eight out of ten people believe the Government should allow more time for debate on the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill.

The bill, which was passed for a second reading on Monday night by 340 votes to 78, includes measures that will permit for the first time in Britain the creation of human-animal hybrid embryos and the use of screening to produce "saviour siblings". The bill also includes changes to the law on fertility treatment, and Gordon Brown has already caved in to pressure to allow a free vote when the most contentious issues are debated on the second reading next Monday and Tuesday.

But MPs are to be given just three hours to debate the issue of hybrid embryos and most people think this is not long enough, the poll found.

According to today's survey of more than 1,000 adults by pollsters ComRes, a member of the British Polling Council, fewer than four in ten people trust Gordon Brown to listen to the views of people on controversial issues. The poll found that seven out of ten people believe one of the Prime Minister's biggest problems is that he doesn’t listen to what the electorate is saying.

Of those who identified themselves in the poll as a member of a Christian church, more than eight out of ten said the Government was wrong to allow the creation of hybrid embryos. The Christians polled also disputed the scientific case for hybrids, and fewer than one in ten Christians were willing to trust matters of ethics and human life to doctors and scientists.

Josephine Quintavalle, of Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said: “This new ComRes poll shows that people are growing increasingly angry that Gordon Brown is forcing this hugely contentious Bill through parliament at breakneck speed without listening to them and his own MPs. The issues it raises, such as those around human-animal embryos, deserve extensive debate. People want debate. And yet Gordon Brown seems determined to deny them and his own MPs anything but the most deliberately restricted opportunities to have that debate. I don’t understand why, only days before a by-election, Gordon Brown would want to risk courting greater unpopularity in this way."

She added: "The findings of this ComRes poll demonstrate that people feel the Prime Minister faces a real challenge not just in persuading voters that he’s listening, but also that they can actually trust him to listen."