Dr. Lydia Bracken:

The need to protect women is a very important point, as is protecting the best interests of the child. To do both it is important that we focus on an altruistic model of surrogacy. Rather than engaging in a commercial surrogacy regime, which poses the risk of offering financial incentives for people to act as a surrogate and skewing any informed consent provided, a focus on an altruistic model would ensure that people are not being distracted by other financial issues going into the arrangement from the outset. In addition, it is important that surrogates are provided with appropriate counselling in advance in order that they understand their role and to ensure they are not being coerced into it. They should also be provided with independent legal advice to ensure they have made an informed choice to become a surrogate and understand the legal and social implications of their role as a surrogate. By putting those safeguards in place, we can protect women who act as surrogates and the children, as well as intending parents. Those safeguards can be legislated for.