Law Commission consulting on paid surrogacy in the UK

I don’t like the Times series on paid- for egg donation and surrogacy: the journalist seems to give very little consideration to the potential thoughts and feelings of the future DC.

The article talks at great length about wanting to properly pay women for surrogacy.

But the truth of the changes required by commissioning parents is in this paragraph:

UK law currently makes surrogacy an informal enterprise with a legal process that takes place entirely after the event. What we need is regulation at the start, through written agreements, counselling, screening and preparation, and independent legal advice for all sides. This will guard against exploitation far more successfully than law which gives no structure until the baby has been born and then ineffectively seeks to restrict payments which have already been made.

The real difference between surrogacy in the UK and the US is the contract. At the moment, women can change their mind after birth, in the US they are locked into a contract at conception.

This is not about protecting children and vulnerable women, it's about protecting commissioning parents.

And this in the guardian today - apparently informed consent will prevent any abuse of vulnerable women. Why on earth didn't we think of that before . No thought given to the children involved either.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/04/surrogacy-money-law-women-payments-fair?CMP=ShareiOSAppp_Other

The more I read, the less convinced I am about any of the surrogacy process.

Has anyone noticed this series in the Times? This woman writes about her experiences of surrogacy.

www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/weekend/surrogacy-and-me-hey-doctor-please-dont-frighten-our-angel-hqsmtwfrx

Perfectly put Ineedacupoftea

@Ineedacupofteadesperately You wrote that so perfectly, thank you.

I am completely against commercial surrogacy for all the reasons previous posters have so eloquently outlined but mainly because I think surrogacy fails the children born of it. It does not put the babies needs first, rather it puts the wants of adults (the want to have a child) first. It is the selling of babies.

I was infertile for many years, suffered many miscarriages and was told by a fertility doctor that I'd never have my own baby (he was wrong) and I felt under pressure to go down ever more ethically dubious roads by the fertility industry. It's relentless, this is the next treatment option, then this, then donor eggs, then go abroad, then surrogacy. There is never any pause for reflection of whether what is happening is right and any consideration for the children that will be born - the newborn is considered to be the end product.

I know how raw that wanting a child is. But the child's rights should come first. No-one has a right to a child. Children are not property. They grow up to be their own people and to have their own thoughts and feelings. I do wonder how the babies born of surrogacy will feel about the adults involved with their birth and the nature of it when they grow up. If you read relationships there are lots of people who are no contact with their parents over issues far less complex and upsetting than surrogacy.

I worry not only about women being used as walking wombs, but also about the possibility of picking some of the baby's traits.

Isn't that a separate risk, associated more with modified IVF than inherent to surrogacy?

Are you seriously minimising the absolute and unrelenting horrors of slavery by making glib, superficial comparisons to paid, voluntary work? Have you any idea how offensive that is?

Oh give over. I wasn't impressed by your pretentious attempts at analysis. You introduced the concept of bad users and good users of surrogacy. The point is irrelevant in the context of surrogacy as a whole. So , not glib or superficial, merely pointing out the glaring flaw in your argument.

I worry not only about women being used as walking wombs, but also about the possibility of picking some of the baby's traits.

Want a white baby? Would you like to increase the odds of having a baby with blue eyes? How about some good genes, no history of cancer in this woman's family! Want a sporty child? This womb belongs to a former athlete!

And then there are all the medical aspects, of course. How many times could a woman carry a baby safely? Should there be a break between pregnancies, and if so, how long? If complications in labour render the "bearer" sterile, should she be compensated by the buyers? If it's a risky pregnancy, and an abortion is necessary to save the woman's life, who gets to decide?

Such a minefield!

Some slave owners apparently were quite kind to their slaves.

Are you seriously minimising the absolute and unrelenting horrors of slavery by making glib, superficial comparisons to paid, voluntary work? Have you any idea how offensive that is?

One person not being "cartoonishly villainous" does not make paid surrogacy fine. Some slave owners apparently were quite kind to their slaves.

No I am not struggling with my preconceptions of what the users of a surrogate might be like. What they might be like as individuals is irrelevant to the ethics of surrogacy.

However the poster failed miserably in making me think any better of paid surrogacy by her ill thought out choice of words.

Sorry but I think she let slip more than she intended. One supply source of babies has dried up to be replaced by surrogacy.

If we are going to go armchair psychologist then do allow me to pull up my wingback and set down a suspiciously-shaped cigar.

In terms of what is being let slip, might I suggest that you are struggling to reconcile your preconceptions about people who use surrogates to have children with the reality of someone who has done so? Finding this person to be not as cartoonishly villainous as you would perversely hope has led you to seize upon any imagined slight encoded within their choice of words, which you have then twisted into a means by which your preconceptions can be soothed, rather than attempting any personal reflection and growth.

In short, it is easier to reach than to grasp.

Regarding your shock at StrawberryFilter's choice of words, though I cannot speak for her directly, they were a potent reminder of how far we have come

Not far enough apparently for Strawberry to realise what a horrible expression she used. I'm almost 60. I've seen this term fall out of use and actually being expunged as a legal concept.

Sorry but I think she let slip more than she intended. One supply source of babies has dried up to be replaced by surrogacy.

How anyone could think that implied approval is just

Finding a reason to be outraged with the presentation of an argument you want to disagree with can be an effective way to silence the individual without making any effective counterpoint.

I criticise the idea that anyone has the right to a child. I find framing the debate in terms of infertile couple's rights and gay men's rights to be horrifying. I stand by this sentiment. The focus should be on protecting vulnerable women from exploitation, and the best interests of the child.

Maniacmagpie that's really well put. I hope very much the review will take that line as well as it's in everyone's best interests.

I guess I've said my bit and will leave it at that.

(Other than to say - again - that when I referred to "the hordes of orphans and illegitimate babies" that used to be adopted it was in reference to the sort of horrific, outdated, thank-god-we-don't-live-in-those-bad-old-days. In the past. When things like orphanages and workhouses existed and language like that was used. How anyone could think that implied approval is just but hey, my wit and irony don't always translate well on a chat forum).

I agree 100% with what maniacmagpie said - brilliantly written.

Yeah, I don't see how that's going to happen. The court will be making the decision about what is best for that individual child. That is what the Act says. The same principles that will prevent us from having the same system as the US will also prevent us from removing surrogacy born children from their parents in the UK. A different decision might perhaps have been made if the court were deciding based on the child's situation before removal from the surrogate, and sometimes is in the UK. But that's not what happens in cases where a baby has been born through surrogacy overseas.

StrawberryFilter What's done is done. I am pleased for you, your surrogate, and your daughter, if there was no coercion involved, and wish your family the best in life.

I criticise the idea that anyone has the right to a child. I find framing the debate in terms of infertile couple's rights and gay men's rights to be horrifying. I stand by this sentiment. The focus should be on protecting vulnerable women from exploitation, and the best interests of the child.

I can sympathise with the struggles of infertility and at once stand by my criticism of a system that I worry to be dangerously open to abuse of poorer women. Having one's own biological child is a desire. A very strong desire, it's true. But a desire, and not a right.

I do not criticise your daughter, because how she came into this world is nothing to with her as a person, and perfectly well believe you capable of being a loving mother to her, regardless of my issues with the possible abuse of a commercial surrogacy system.

When I argue against commercial surrogacy I don't look at your daughter and think she is implicated in this somehow or want to contribute to some stigma about her. I don't look at you and want to make your life more difficult for the hell of it. I want to protect her as a woman, and you as a woman, from the possibility of being exploited for your wombs, in cases where you may be in financial difficulties, or under emotional coercion. I think that nobody should have the right to buy access to your wombs.

It is my suggestion that being prepared to buy a child probably should preclude those individuals from becoming the legal parents of that child

That would not be applying the principles of the children act. Assuming at least one of the purchasing couple is the bio parent of the child, and the child has been resident with the purchasing couple, the welfare principles of the children act would preclude making any changes to the child's circumstances without meeting the threshold of significant harm, which being conceived by surrogacy would not meet the legal test for.

@StrawberryFilter "relentlessly focussing on the the rare fuckups in surrogacy is always going to miss the point for most of us grateful parents."

Yeah but this discussion is not about you about you (people who've become parents via surrogacy). It's about the surrogates (and the children they give birth to). They are the people who are at risk due to surrogacy. You're not. You've got your child. You've got what you wanted. But you've done it in a way which could cause untold problems for future women (and children), and saying "oh but the surrogate we used is absolutely fine with it all" really really misses the point.

I have no negative feelings about your dd @StrawberryFilter but I do about your actions.

Wanting a child, however desperately, doesn't confer the right to have one. As someone said upthread - the ends do not justify the means. You used the body of another woman because of your own desires. You can keep telling yourself that you didn't exploit her but the fact that there are so few altruistic surrogates available in the uk should tell you that actually, there are a vanishingly tiny minority of women who "just loooove pregnancy so much" that they are willing to risk their own physical and mental health, as well as that of their offspring, in order to be a surrogate mother.

The reason you went to the US is that they have allowed the exploitation of women through surrogacy there. That is why it is easier to find a surrogate there, and why it is easier still if you look in India. Stop kidding yourself that you're some sort of worthy exception to the concerns which people have raised about people who are prepared to use other women's bodies in this way.

On a separate but related note, someone was talking about how you might apply the principles of the children act to couples who bring a child acquired through a foreign surrogacy arrangement back to the uk. It is my suggestion that being prepared to buy a child probably should preclude those individuals from becoming the legal parents of that child. They have shown that they are prepared to participate in the purchase of another human being for their own purposes and it is difficult to see how it would be in the best interests of that child to remain with parents who view them as a commodity.

strawberryfilter I expect you have a passing understanding of class analysis and radical feminist analysis of female oppression, even if you don't entirely agree. So I am sure that you understand the concerns that feminists have about the commodification of female bodies on principle and the commercialisation of pregnancy and babies?

Yes, you did what you had to to get your baby. I sympathise with that, and most people do. But the system of surrogacy that you benefited from is deeply flawed and contributes to the oppression of women. Regardless of how your particular surrogate feels about things, that's fact.

LassWiADelicateAir , stigmatising surrogacy is potentially harmful to children born through that method because it casts the means of their development as 'wrong'.

Regarding your shock at StrawberryFilter's choice of words, though I cannot speak for her directly, they were a potent reminder of how far we have come. I was fortunate enough to have been able to talk to someone in the 80s who was old enough to remember women gaining the right to vote, she pointed out that there was a time when the mere notion of women being treated as equals was grossly offensive to the majority of the population.