A day before International Children’s Rights Day, a major conference entitled “Surrogacy: An Ethical and Political Challenge for Europe” was held at the European Parliament, bringing together Members of the European Parliament, international experts, human rights organisations, and individuals directly affected by surrogacy.
The purpose of the event was to examine the ethical, legal, and political implications of surrogacy in Europe and to assess how the European Union can protect the rights of women and children in the face of a rapidly expanding global industry.
The event was organised by Members of the European Parliament Paolo Inselvini, Bert-Jan Ruissen, and Stephen Nikola Bartulica. The opening session featured interventions from Laurence Trochu, Jadwiga Wiśniewska, Carlo Fidanza, and Nicola Procaccini, Co-Chair of the ECR Group.
Laoise de Brún BL, CEO and founder of The Countess, was invited to speak by the ECR parliamentary group as country expert on surrogacy as Ireland has just adopted a new legislative framework which attempts to normalise surrogacy by banning commercial surrogacy in Ireland while permitting it abroad and allowing for altruistic surrogacy.
In her address to parliament Laoise stated that there was no way to mitigate the harm of the separation for both the baby and the surrogate mother and there was no way to stop babies being trafficked and surrogate mothers being exploited.
Ireland has undergone a dramatic cultural, social and political transformation; in the past 30 years we have gone from the most Catholic country in the world to the most radical progressive.
Not content with removing the meaning of sex in law and the protective rights that attach to the sex class of female, by adopting a radical gender self ID model in 2015 which allows any man to simply fill out a form and “become” a woman, for all purposes, last year the Irish government attempted to remove Article 41.2 from our constitution.
The Countess campaigned to retain the constitutional rights and recognition of mothers and 73.9% of the public voted to reject the amendment. The role of the mother had to be degraded into something replaceable, to a mere carer, in order to make way for surrogacy.
The Assisted Human Reproduction bill was brought forward and enacted in June 2024.
Laoise’s experience as a Lactation Consultant informs her understanding of mother–infant bonding.
She said “As lactation consultants we are experts on the proto relationship between the mother and the baby that starts in utero. We know that the baby must be placed on the mother’s breast and feed within the first hour, the golden hour. This relationship is more than nutrition it is bonding and bonding as Bowlby taught is an evolutionary response that our survival depends on. The baby knows the mother’s heartbeat, voice and smell, she is the only world the baby knows. The mother’s nipple tastes exactly like the amniotic fluid it was just submerged in. The baby has reflexes to help it move up the mother’s body to find the breast. The mother’s vascular and respiratory system will synch with the baby’s and regulate it which is why premature babies have less apnoea in kangaroo care, strapped to their mother’s chest than in incubators.”
The Motherbaby dyad is one system, one biological and social unit. Surrogacy is the ripping asunder of the motherbaby dyad.
As keynote speaker Reem Asaleem concludes in her report there is no way to mitigate the harm done by this separation.
And yet this is exactly what the new legislative framework in Ireland purports to do!
By regulating surrogacy for the first time in Ireland covering both domestic and international arrangements. It establishes a framework for altruistic surrogacy and prohibits commercial surrogacy. The Assisted Human Reproduction Regulatory Authority provides for oversight and approval but it has no teeth no criminal sanctions available and of course no jurisdiction outside Ireland. It takes as its premise that surrogacy can be regulated to made ethical and offset exploitation and harm. But this framework will be unable to prevent the trafficking of babies from poor countries or surrogate mothers into the country as they only need to resident only two years.
The Act completely prioritises the rights and demands of intending parents over child’s best interests
It disregards the will of the Irish people around the recognition of the role and importance of mothers
As a campaigner against Trans ideology and as a journalist, it is interesting to see the same playbook deployed both in the media and in parliament.
Rushed through in an abuse of parliamentary process and without a vote.
Vapid axiomatic slogans “Surrogacy is just another way to have a family”.
Celebrities and politicians who commissioned babies used as PR.
Ministers encouraged to have their photo with these children.
A drip-feed of first-person stories to manipulate the public but media blackout of the reality of the legislation resulting in a lack of awareness.
Laoise said “When I tell people that a single man of 21 can legally commission a baby in Ireland, they are speechless with shock.”
The debate was framed as old Catholic Ireland against new Ireland a Beacon of a modernity where the market provides the demands of the consumer. There is nothing old fashioned or even right-wing about protecting women and children.
We will not allow this law to normalise the rent of a womb and the sale of a baby and it must not be used as a model law to roll out more sanitisation or normalisation frameworks in other jurisdictions.
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