Mr. Gearóid Kenny Moore:

I can speak to the question around the negative experiences that some people might have had. When it comes to a surrogacy journey, there are so many components and factors. There is the IVF clinic, there is the egg donation process, there is the surrogate and her welfare and there are the intended parents, so it is a complex area. No matter what aspect of human life we look at, there will be always good players and bad players. Even in an environment where things are highly regulated, there can be situations where people do not behave according to the rules associated with that regulation. It is unavoidable and beyond the capability of any committee or any group to prevent bad actors from trying to become part of a particular journey, a particular business or a particular area.

I spoke about the Canadian model in my address. That is a highly regulated environment. For international parents who travel to Canada to try to become parents of a child, they have to go through a government-approved and appointed agency and register with it before they can do anything else. That agency then takes responsibility for understanding where the couple are coming from in terms of when they perceive being able to start a journey, in what geographical locations in Canada they might want to start their journey and so on. That agency is responsible for gathering the data around that couple and what their aspirations are and it then takes on an advisory role, similar to what we spoke about potentially for a group like Irish Families Through Surrogacy, which is doing it voluntarily right now, with regard to advising the intended parents on the clinics that might be appropriate for them and the lawyers who might be able to help them.

My point is that even when we regulate it, we are still going to have bad actors. Every industry in Ireland is highly regulated from a medical perspective yet we have had situations where those who partake in the industry still act as bad actors. We can never do something that safeguards it and locks it down in such a way that it would prevent bad experiences.

We can put in place processes and government-appointed agencies and clinics that would be good actors to guide people in an ethical way towards achieving their dream of parenthood. I do not know whether this helps.