An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-06
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Sarah O'Reilly (AON), Agricultural Panel

Hatch Fertility is an egg donation and surrogacy agency based in LA. The agency advertised this as an educational seminar with one of the best teams in the business, the business of babies and bites.
It is undeniable that these companies are commodifying children and using surrogacy as a business venture. Commercial surrogacy is illegal in Ireland. Countries like Spain, France and Italy recognise that surrogacy is not in the best interests of the child or the surrogate mother. The EU directive on human trafficking especially references surrogacy as a form of exploitation of women.
Why do we and the agents of the State acknowledge the loss of biological parents to adoptive children but promote it in surrogacy? Why do we recognise the importance of and allow for the continued connection for biological parents during fostering? Why would we intentionally create a scenario where a child's connection to their biological parent is deliberately cut off? This goes against accepted best practice and is not child-centred. I absolutely empathise with couples who wish to start their own families but we cannot place the wants of adults above what is in the best interests of children. We cannot ignore such an important question when it comes to the well-being of our children.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-06/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:54+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-06