To make you aware that surrogacy is going to be liberalised

[VestaTilley]

Today, the Law Commission have published their final recommendations to Government, calling for reform of surrogacy laws in the U.K.

The proposed change would make commissioning parents legal parents at birth. That means that the birth mother would never be regarded as the legal parent, nor would she be listed on the birth certificate.

This has been privately lobbied for behind closed doors, away from women and maternity groups for years. The Law Commission consulted in 2019, but never published their responses or said who had fed in to their consultation.

Law firms and surrogacy agencies are rubbing their hands with glee today: I feel physically sick.

They would have you believe surrogacy in this country is “altruistic”. This is not the case. Women can receive upwards of £20,000 per pregnancy in “expenses” - which is a huge financial incentive to a woman if they are from a poor background.

Do we want to live in a society which creates a servant class of women? Which takes babies away from their mothers at birth?

When pregnant we are all advised to bond with our babies, breastfeed if we can and speak to our babies in utero. How does the NHS square this advice with making it legal for a child to never legally have a connection to its own mother?

If you are in anyway concerned about these proposals please, please contact your MP and raise all the noise you can to try and stop this before it is too late:

https://www.lawcom.gov.uk/surrogacy-laws-to-be-overhauled-under-new-reforms-benefitting-the-child-surrogate-and-intended-parents/

Ihave responded to the tweet actually and said what has surprised surrogates about the proposal and I could go into the reasons why but they're a bit niche which they are. I think you just want to make the point that surrogates want to have time to change their mind though and suffice to say that's not it.

That sounds like 'you're wrong but you're too dim to understand why you're wrong if I explain it so I'm not going to', is that what you meant? Because I've seen a lot of thoughtful reasoned points made on this thread, so I think we're probably capable of grasping your 'niche' reasoning.

New thread here in case this one tops out:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4775695-to-tell-you-surrogacy-is-going-to-be-liberalised-thread-2

She used the money to buy a luxury car.

That's the going rate for a human baby, is it? Fucking hell. Yeah my mom sold me and bought a car - definitely not going to fuck me up in any way though because the people who bought me really wanted to.

I’m still against commercial/paid surrogacy after reading this thread. I think the only type of surrogacy I would support would be a private arrangement within families. Although that can still have issues. It did happen in the past that children were “farmed out” if for example one woman had many children and a relative had none.

This.

It's obscene.

A ruse? So every surrogate has read the entirety of the documents and understood them?

Every surrogate has the ability to understand the legal language in them too?

I am sorry but the consultation itself had over 100 questions, the documents surrounding this are complex and it’s IPs who’ve had a successful (for them) journey and organisations who can profiteer from the proposal that are supporting it. Women’s charities are completely against it. I’m against these proposals and the damage they can do women.

If you know that not a lot of salary is paid, do you have the figure for the salaries of all the surrogacy organisation employees? Are you able to direct me to the source?

This sums it up. And do t forget, the Law Commission want to relax the rules around advertising.

So you say 'many' UK surrogates don't have the capacity (!!!) to understand or read the reforms. I know they're all over it - this is not India where women are forced into commercial surrogacy and may never have been to school. So I responded that your remarks are a ruse to ignore and silence the many surrogates who are coming forward with their views and who contributed to the drafting of the reform. You respond most oddly by pretending I must be saying that every last surrogate has definitely read the reform and you were presumably meaning, when you said that many wouldn't read it, that not everyone would read it. Stop gaslighting. You said many wouldn't be able to read it and wouldn't be interested. That's bollocks and you need to wind your neck in. That's what I was responding to.

You're not in good faith at all. I couldn't be hassled to engage with further points from someone who twists their own words in that fashion.

And yes, surrogates don't tend to operate alone so there has been a concerted push for parental responsibility at birth for IPs by them for years - they have been contributing to all the consultations, writing to their MPs, discussing it, creating and signing petitions for years - long before most people on this thread woke up to what was going on. They know exactly what is required to better facilitate clarity around care giving and to iron out kinks and safeguarding issues in a process that is already happening within a legislative framework that is currently not fit for purpose.

This is not India.

No I didn't think you'd be incapable of grasping it. Unlike some of the feminists on this thread, I think women are clever.

I'm glad you understand. Transparency in the courts and with a regulatory body, none of your business on mumsnet.

You seem determined to take sentences and repeat them wisely as if making a great point. You are free to do that with someone else's posts but I'm not wasting more time on it.

Surrogates want shared parental responsibility at birth just in case I'm the very rare event that something has gone south in the relationship-they want to be able to manage the hours after labour in their own way. It's not because they might want to keep the child.

I repeat sentences so to provide clarity on what I am referring to, and once a post has been quoted you cannot use that method again.

So I do this

Surrogates want shared parental responsibility at birth

This isn't what the law commission have suggested, and what has been suggested is meant to be in-line with what surrogate mothers and lobbyists want. So after much deliberation and 4 years the draft bill still hasn't delivered on this despite close co-ordination with key 'stakeholders'. So someone here has f'd up.

I have actually read the report. 'Shared responsibility' for U.K. arrangements doesn't come close.

How very accusatory. People do tend to get defensive when they’re wrong 🤷‍♂️

The fact you raise the intended parents being parents at birth as a point is what is being touted to surrogates as the purpose of the reform. It’s not. That’s one tiny, minuscule element of it. It’s about control.

I can see that we won’t agree and that’s ok, I’d hazard to guess that you’re linked with a surrogacy organisation or agency and set to benefit. I and I hope many on this thread will be writing to their MP to oppose the proposals.

none of your business on mumsnet.

Actually surrogacy is every woman's business as it is only women who are expected to step up and be kind and share their reproductive fecundity around.

The so called altruistic model is even worse than open commercial in some ways in so far as many players (lawyers, counsellors, fertility doctors, surrogacy agencies, advertisers, even banks who offer specific financial packages to fund ART) make a profit but the woman is expected to do it for free because women just love going through pregnancy and childbirth to gift babies to strangers. 🙄

Nordic model on Twitter has stated that they will be issuing some guidance and points for writing to your MP. I will try to come back and post the link when they do for anyone that is interested.

In fact @Markasread you've spent some time on this thread telling us how surrogate mothers want exactly the opposite and want no responsibly at birth as taking a call to approve medical treatment for a new born interrupts their busy lives.

It can't be both.

No I didn't think you'd be incapable of grasping it.

Okay, could you explain it then please?

The so called altruistic model is even worse than open commercial in some ways in so far as many players (lawyers, counsellors, fertility doctors, surrogacy agencies, advertisers, even banks who offer specific financial packages to fund ART) make a profit but the woman is expected to do it for free because women just love going through pregnancy and childbirth to gift babies to strangers. 🙄

Indeed. Maybe we should just go the whole hog and have an agreed fee scale for surrogacy - pay more for a white middle class incubator, less for a working class one, a premium for twin incubators etc.

So long as there is a discount or right to refund in the case of below par goods.

I am not that happy with the attachment argument against surrogacy (esp as I am in favour of removing children from abusive parents). My objection is that a woman is being paid to rent out her womb and the child she bears is then not considered hers, although her body made that child. It smacks of buying a child and of using a woman as a biological receptacle that has no other value. Slavery, essentially - for slavery treats people as 'things', 'living tools'. Whether the mother consents willingly, could do with the money, is happy to give up the child of her body, or the child will suffer trauma is actually irrelevant to the point that technology is allowing (encouraging) the commodification of women (further commodification, since prostitution and the porn industry already commodify women) and children - making them things to buy and sell. That is my objection to surrogacy.

No they don't actually want it. You're right, it isn't both. But to take away PR automatically diminishes their power straight after delivery. This is not usually an issue - in the overwhelming majority of cases, the hours post birth are what the surrogate has done the entire pregnancy to see. They have the opportunity to witness the family they've created and it's a very special time. Once they've done that, they want to go back to their own families. They don't want to do any baby care whatever - I have never heard of or met anyone who does. However rarely surrogates find that there is an issue in the relationship between themselves and the ips. This doesn't mean they don't want to hand the baby over or necessarily that they regret the surrogacy. They really don't want to be in a position, in that rare outcome, where they feel like ips can just walk out of the room with the baby. They want the power to hand the baby over themselves when they feel ready to do so. It may sound like a small thing but the there is nothing a surrogate would hate more than not being in control of the timings post birth in the event that the relationship had become tense. The only thing they'd hate more would be the ips not turning up to collect the baby - hence the push for PR from birth for IPs. It's important to stress that these instances are worst case scenarios because surrogates plan for these in order to avoid them. The emphasis on having everything discussed beforehand, not rushing and building a resilient friendship goes a long way to a successful enduring relationship that benefits the child.

I did

I have never heard of or met anyone who does.

You have never heard of anyone who does? Did you not reply re the 2011 case and call the surrogate mother a mum? She did. Did you already forget?

And no, you didn't read the tweet.

There are at least 2 cases on this thread alone but you "have never heard of or met anyone who does" (change their minds).

A short memory explains a lot...

"No they don't actually want it."

So they don't actually want shared parental rights? and yet you also said earlier...

"Surrogates want shared parental responsibility at birth"

Christ this is confusing. I'm won't engage further with you @Markasread as this is going around in circles and no longer making sense to me.

But to take away PR automatically diminishes their power straight after delivery. This is not usually an issue - in the overwhelming majority of cases, the hours post birth are what the surrogate has done the entire pregnancy to see. They have the opportunity to witness the family they've created and it's a very special time. Once they've done that, they want to go back to their own families. They don't want to do any baby care whatever - I have never heard of or met anyone who does. However rarely surrogates find that there is an issue in the relationship between themselves and the ips. This doesn't mean they don't want to hand the baby over or necessarily that they regret the surrogacy. They really don't want to be in a position, in that rare outcome, where they feel like ips can just walk out of the room with the baby. They want the power to hand the baby over themselves when they feel ready to do so. It may sound like a small thing but the there is nothing a surrogate would hate more than not being in control of the timings post birth in the event that the relationship had become tense. The only thing they'd hate more would be the ips not turning up to collect the baby - hence the push for PR from birth for IPs.

So surrogates (if we assume they all feel the same) simultaneously want to retain PR and control the handover, and want the purchasers to have PR so they can't refuse the baby once it's born?

That makes no sense to me - if the purchasers have PR from birth, the surrogate will not then have control over the handover - the purchasers have PR, they can take the baby whenever they like. If that is what surrogates want, it's not possible under the law as I understand it - you have PR or you don't. If the purchasers have it, the surrogate cannot control the handover.