Law Commission consulting on paid surrogacy in the UK

[PimmsnLemonade]

Sorry, I've no share token:

www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/surrogate-mothers-could-be-allowed-to-charge-cash-gfktl290j

Whats the betting that the first paid-for surrogacy clinic is in Leeds?

At the very very minimum there should be adoption like checks, plus checks on the surrogates welfare/motivation. Otherwise we are in buy-a-baby territory. Oh wait, someone just tried to do that in Leeds.

MrsSpenserGregson Sorry to hear about your experience. I did some reading about it because I was separated from my mum due to a traumatic birth. I had emotional regulation problems from a very early age, and I sometimes wonder if birth trauma caused it. I learned about how trauma imprints on the body through writers such as Bessel van der Kolk, Peter Levine and Gabor Mate. I think the popular belief is that if a baby doesn't remember it it won't affect them, but actually it affects your whole neurological and emotional development because you have that feeling of not being safe, which never really leaves you. And often you end up having no idea why if you can't remember, you just feel like you're a bad person.

Some human rights should be so sacrosanct that they cannot be forfeited, even by a willing person.
Because there are two sides to a transaction. Giver and taker. Seller and buyer. One side may seem beyond reproach, but viewed in the opposite direction the act is horrific.

Why is slavery wrong? What kind of contract skates so close to slavery that humans are unable to exercise what should be inalienable human rights?

Should any person be able, with the support of the law, to force a woman to abort against her will?
Should any law support the removal of a child from her mother against both their interests because a commercial contract outweighs their human rights?
Can we buy and sell people?
Can a woman's uterus literally be considered to hold the property of a man and should the law allow him rights over her body because he owns her?

What happens to women who change their minds?

I know the surrogacy industry tells us this is a 'service'. But unless a woman is completely free to exercise her rights to her own body and her own child at all times, and unless her rights and her child's rights always outweigh any contract, at every stage of the process and for life, it's simply sanctioned slavery and the purchase of people.

@Barracker yes!

@EverardDigby Thank you, and I'm sorry to hear about your experience too. I will check those writers out for sure.

That puts it well Barracker. No woman can be compelled by law to have an abortion. That applies no matter how much a man claims he was tricked- even if the scare stories about pins in condoms/ scooping the used condom out of the bin were true.

A woman will only be forced to give up a baby in extreme cases where there is a serious risk to the baby's safety- quite rightly putting the baby first.

For surrogacy to be acceptable (and I personally don't think it is) it has to have absolutes. Only the women has any right to decide to abort or not abort . The woman can choose to keep the baby. Provision for paternal access/ shared parenting could apply as in any other situation where the parents are not a couple, if father is suitable.

And in no circumstances can the fatber refuse to take the child, if it is the woman's choice to give baby up.

Yes, I should clarify that when I said about payments, this should of course include an absolute right for the mother to change her mind after birth and to forfeit payment.

However, obviously there will be a right for the father to refuse to take the baby too- nobody can be forced to be a parent, including men. In those circumstances, the baby must be looked after by the state.

I should clarify my comment about the father not being allowed to refuse to take the baby- of course he would if he went through the process, in agreement with the mother , of putting the child into state care. He should not otherwise simply walk away from his responsibilities.

Ah okay, that makes sense.

Why should the state be expected to pick up the pieces? And the poor baby treated like a defective item you bought on eBay and need to sell on?
And if money is going to come into it, eg pp suggestion of making it a meaty payment in region of £50k they can damn well pay for the medical services privately. No way should the NHS be bearing the costs of this.

”If you got a group of misogynists in a room and said how can we make this system work for men and not for women they would not have come up with too many ideas that are not already in place,”

Professor Philip Alston, UN rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights

UK Austerity has inflicted great misery on citizens UN says

Poor? Female? Young? Pick your “profession”- prostitution or incubation.

For clarity I am absolutely opposed to surrogacy for all the reasons previously discussed especially by Barracker but the consultation absolutely should include consideration of costs to the NHS and responsibilities of the state. IVF treatment is increasingly difficult to get on the NHS and I don't think the NHS should be expected to support this massive consumer entitlement.

Did you see the link I posted about the case in 2015, lass?

What terrifies me is that the mother didn't pose any threat to her child. She loved her and raised her alone for, I think, 15 months. The arrangement had always been that she would be the mother. It was her own biological child. She breastfed her, carried her in a sling and mothered her in what sounds like pretty much the way I mothered my own children.

There was no question over the fitness of her parenting of her child.

The judge portrayed her as homophobic. Which may or may not be true, but isn't cause to remove a toddler from her mother. And given that the judge also was scathing about her breastfeeding and attachment parenting and chose to characterise those choices as if they were weapons rather than perfectly valid parenting choices, I view the judge's position as biased. The mother knew the commisioning couple were gay when the agreement was struck, so the apparent homophobia didn't extend to her being friends with the men and agreeing this with them.

And yet her child was removed entirely from her care and given to two men with whom she had no real relationship at that point. The mother was restricted to supervised access.

Iused2ban I meant that the state has to step in if all parties abandon the child. There is no way around this. It's better for the child to be in foster care than to be with someone who doesn't want it.

As for NHS, I presume you mean for the birth? I don't think a surrogate giving birth on the NHS is a problem, because she would be entitled to do so had she got pregnant any other way.

I am not pro-surrogacy, by the way. I just feel it's so wrong and hypocritical to say that it is allowed as long as nobody gets paid. That totally devalues what women are being asked to do and go through. If they do it, they should be compensated. However, as others have pointed out, financial reward would be open to abuse and if that cannot be protected against, then it should be banned altogether.

Altruism fucks women over and has meant that we have had to give up our reproductive work for free since the dawn of time. If men value it so much, make them pay for it.

Agree with others that this has been on the horizon for a while.

Also agree that teh arguments for (it's going to happen anyway so let's try and make it slightly less exploitative) are feeble. The argument in this case that if UK women aren't allowed to be paid surrogates, then poor women overseas will be exploited. So it's best if poor women here are allowed to be exploited as well.

Pushback against the gains that women and girls have made is in full swing.

Joining the dots makes the future look bleak.

I expect the state could step in and take the unwanted babies and sell them. Of course it wouldn't actually be selling them, just charging administration costs.

Sorry, I have actually no idea what the answer is, just a sense that the handmaid's tale might end up being used as a hand-book.

The conversation around comerncial surrogacy, the arguments used, the minimisation of the risks to the woman, the presentation of it as an excellent money making choice for the modern empowerfulised woman, the absolute non-consideration of any psychological effects -
All the same as prostitution.

I see the two as very similar anyway.

I am strongly against commercial surrogacy in the UK and would like to see the exploitation of women elsewhere in the world clamped down on.

And yet her child was removed entirely from her care and given to two men with whom she had no real relationship at that point. The mother was restricted to supervised access.

How the hell can this ever be in the best interests of the child?

Peakpants of course the state would step in if the child is abandoned. It does so not infrequently with ordinary babies conceived and born the ordinary way, I have had personal involvement with a baby born with Down's syndrome and rejected by its parents. It still feels worse to me to commission a product (the baby, a defenceless human being) and then decide it doesn't meet the brief so the state can sort it.
Also, whilst the woman would indeed be entitled to free maternity care if she were having her own baby, surrogacy is likely to involve some specific treatments/procedures as well as the ongoing maternity care. If something went badly wrong for the mother or baby the NHS will pick up the pieces, just as it does when that cut price boob implant done abroad causes problems. I still think people commissioning a product should be liable for ALL costs not just the mother's personal expenses.

Which is all hypothetical as my deeply held belief is that surrogacy is exploitative and immoral and should be banned.

Barracker I didn’t realise the baby was her biological child - I understand the judgement even less now.

It seems more and more that our laws are so badly written that they are open to interpretations that were never intended. .gov.uk says The woman who gives birth is always treated as the legal mother and has the right to keep the child - even if they’re not genetically related. Surrogacy contracts aren’t enforced by UK law

There is a big difference between paid and altruistic surrogacy. Any minimum price you put on it will be whittled away. On the other hand, how would you police banning altruistic surrogacy- who would be prosecuted?

I hadn't really thought much about surrogacy before reading these boards - I always thought that it was going to be altruistic and what a lovely gift to give. However, I am really against surrogacy at all now, women once again are being exploited and used as a commodity. The room for complete exploitation if these regulations were relaxed is terrifying - handmaid's tale in action.

That story about the toddler removed from the mother is horrific, truly abhorrent.

I find the attitudes of some people, many of them men, that they want a baby so we'll just buy one, really, really selfish.

We all have shit to deal with. Not having a convenient womb to use might be upsetting, but if you value people you don't treat them like dehumanized property.

And yes, I see the trans issue as tangential. We are not just disembodied essences floating in random meat chunks. There is real harm to real people when they are coerced into disassociating from their body.

God I've just read that article Barracker. It's horrifying.

The case Barracker referred to was appalling. The judge made disgraceful comments and clearly had no understanding or sympathy for child mother attachment , breastfeeding and the well being of the child.

It makes me think of Rumplestiltskin.
Forced to honour an evil deal made when you have no possible idea of what it will mean. Paying with your child. People believing they are 'owed' a mother's child, their dues.

The law is enforcing evil fairytales written to
warn terrify children about the bad in the world. Except real life is now supporting the wicked gnome and making sure Rumplestiltskin gets to walk away with the baby he 'bought'.