Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I just wanted to check that. Professor Madden also referenced the avoidance of potential exploitation, which we must all be concerned about. It is a very serious issue, which I raised when this Bill was considered first. How can this be achieved? Will it take a legal agreement? Can it be achieved? Is it optimal to build it into the legislation, or would it be preferable to produce guidelines that might ensure proper procedures? The difficulty is obvious when people travel outside of Ireland. As Professor Madden has said, we then have to marry two different sets of laws. As a committee and as legislators we clearly do not want to do something that will somehow inadvertently lead to exploitation. We need to have those safeguards in place. I am interested in the views of the witness, although we may not have time to discuss this now as it is a bit complicated. If that is the case, she could send us some of the research.

Ms Keegan referred to the upper age limit of 47 as being problematic. Does she have an upper age limit in mind? Should a limit apply? I am interested in her view. She also mentioned that most surrogacy takes place abroad. Are there any figures on that? I am aware that this area is not highly regulated. Perhaps the witness could hold off on answering and I will ask all of my questions together if that is okay. Do we have any idea of the percentage breakdown of surrogacies abroad?

Dr. Hayes and Ms Keegan provided conflicting views in their submissions. Dr. Hayes said that a birth by surrogacy certificate should be issued, while Ms Keegan said that people should not be given information they do not necessarily need or will want to look for. Can each witness comment on the other's viewpoint, in order to ascertain the best arrangement? It is tricky. In one respect it is correct to say that it is information that people have not looked for, but that does not mean that they do not have a right to it. How do we marry those two viewpoints?

Dr. Rose spoke about her intention to carry out "damage limitation". We received a submission from the Iona Institute, co-authored by Dr. Rose, in which questions are raised about family structures. I fully support the rights of same-sex couples to adopt and raise children. Does Dr. Rose see the exclusion of same-sex couples as being part of that damage limitation exercise? Does she have a view on that? It would be very interesting for us to know that.

Ms O'Friel, in her submission, referred to a TV3 documentary and made reference to "the industry". I am aware that she studied medicine for two years, although she is obviously not a doctor. Does she have any academic evidence? She referred to industry advertisements and a TV3 documentary, but does she have any empirical or academic evidence to back up her assertions? I would be grateful if she could provide us with some of that evidence here, and perhaps she can send us a comprehensive list afterwards. We have a huge amount of reading, consideration and discussion to do on this legislation, and there will not be an easy way to do that. We have to get right in and read all of the available academic research and expert evidence.