Oireachtas

Groundbreaking legislation to regulate surrogacy and fertility clinics passed almost 20 years after first mooted

Bill will license and regulate fertility clinics for the first time and allow for domestic and international surrogacy

The Bill also provides for and will regulate domestic and international surrogacy, where one parent has a genetic link to the child. Photograph: Andrew Matthews/PA Wire

Marie O'Halloran
Wed Jun 26 2024 - 20:23

Legislation to regulate domestic and international surrogacy and to license fertility clinics and treatment has been passed by the Oireachtas, and will now go to the President for consideration.

The landmark Assisted Human Reproduction Bill has been almost 20 years in the making, while Ireland has been one of just two EU member states not to have a regulatory system in place.

Passed by the Dáil last month and in the Seanad on Wednesday, the Bill establishes the Assisted Human Reproduction Regulatory Authority which will license fertility clinics and oversee and enforce statutory provisions regarding gamete and embryo storage, research and testing.

The authority will also administer the National Donor Conceived Person Register and the National Surrogacy Register, and provide access to information for children born through assisted human reproduction both in Ireland and abroad.

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The Bill also provides for and will regulate domestic and international surrogacy, where one parent has a genetic link to the child.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said the Bill builds on the new fertility services put in place and “it builds on the State-funded IVF model which we’ve rolled out. It will now help facilitate donor assisted IVF including same-sex female couples, which I’ve committed to funding”.

Further amending legislation will be introduced to deal with other complex issues that would have delayed the passage of the Bill.

Fine Gael Senator Mary Seery Kearney, a mother through surrogacy, welcomed the passage of the legislation and said that it would give certainty for families, including her own, who have waited a long time for legal recognition of their parent-child relationships.

In a statement she said it was “nearly 19 years since the Commission on Assisted Human Reproduction first recommended the establishment of a regulatory authority and that we legislate for surrogacy.

“Many children have been born in the interim via surrogacy and have been in the precarious position that only their biological fathers are their recognised parents in Irish law. Their mothers, or in the case of same-sex male couples, second fathers, have no standing other than guardianship. This means that on a child’s 18th birthday they become legal strangers to their parents.

“Ireland is now the first country to legislate for a framework that enshrines the Verona Principles, which are internationally recognised and set out by the International Social Services organisation, a UN recognised organisation, which ensures that an ethical surrogacy is undertaken in the best interests of any child or children born.

“Crucially, this Bill also provides that the parents of those children already born via surrogacy can apply to the High Court for parental orders to secure their lifelong relationship with their children.”

Members of the Seanad, the Minister and the Irish Families Through Surrogacy support group, advocates and their children celebrated outside the gates of Leinster House after the Bill’s passage.

The legislation had sparked heated debate in the Seanad and Independent Senator Rónán Mullen who opposed surrogacy but particularly international surrogacy, hit out at the “sinister disregard for the will of the public around the recognition of the role and importance of mothers”.

“The legislation provides that two intending parents are not required and that a single male aged 21 or over may be an ‘intending parent’ and enter a surrogacy agreement with a woman in Ireland or overseas.”

He said the legislation “will enable the exploitation of impoverished women in Ireland and especially in poorer countries abroad. That is exploitation by financially advantaged women and men who want a baby created to their own preference.”

Marie O'Halloran

Marie O'Halloran

Marie O'Halloran is Parliamentary Correspondent of The Irish Times

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