Dr. Andrea Mulligan:

Exactly. All adoption means in this context is that it is the only way to transfer parental status. Adoption is a legal mechanism for transferring parental status. It is normal now but it was a very novel idea when it was brought into Irish law in the 1950s. That is what it means in this context. It was a way to deal with the parental status.

On the Senator's earlier point, the law is extremely gendered by accident whereby an intended father essentially has complete rights - like any intended father in surrogacy - and an intended mother has essentially no rights. It is very problematic if there is a marital breakdown. It is even more problematic if they were never married in the first place. There could have a situation whereby there may be no way for the mother to establish her rights at all. That is very problematic. One consequence of this inertia is that we have this extremely gendered and unfair situation whereby intended mothers are very badly treated. I still believe what I said about the importance of the gestator but the invisibility of the genetic mother is unacceptable.