Mary Seery Kearney (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am thrilled that the Minister is here and we are not talking about Covid-19.The Minister has come in so many times and we hoped for a day like this when we would deal with the normal everyday issues. I congratulate him of the women's health action plan, which is a considerable piece of work, and it is fantastic to bring forward what was begun in the task force under my colleague, Deputy Harris. I also congratulate him on bringing it to reality and negotiating the budget. It has significant elements in it. I welcome the clinics; having a focus on maternal bereavement supports is really important. A cohort in our society needs a response to what is an appalling tragedy in their lives and there are other dimensions to that. I really welcome that.

We are beginning the review of the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018 and in that I call for the need for safe access zones. I understand, I have heard and I take on board what the Minister has said previously on whether legislation is required but the fact is that it is happening. Women are intimidated from accessing services and GPs are intimidated from providing services so we need to implement that. I also welcome the Minister's commitment to the funding of IVF. It is important that IVF services are accessible and affordable and that there are supports in place for all couples. Where I would bring that conversation would be how will we determine who gets access to it. We need to ensure no impediments are put in the way of women and couples with disabilities.

The most fantastic campaigner from the Independent Living Movement Ireland, Selina Bonnie, has been in before the Joint Committee on Disability Matters and the Joint Committee on International Surrogacy. Her experience before she could access assisted human reproduction services in her long journey to the birth of her child was that at one stage she was asked to prove that she would not have a disabled child before she could be permitted access to the services. When we are putting the supports for IVF in place we need to make sure there are no impediments for anyone with a disability, that there is the same access and that, if anything, we have positive discrimination in favour of people with disabilities to be supported on their journeys to growing their families. That needs to be a priority. Aligned to that is the fact that many same-sex couples, particularly women, need the support of assisted human reproduction to grow their families but they are put through fertility tests and all sorts that they have to pay for in private clinics in Ireland, which are totally and utterly unnecessary. We need to be mindful of that and I hope the assisted human reproduction authority has a role in prescribing that. One of the untapped gems or Cinderellas of women's health is polycystic ovary syndrome and we need to raise awareness of this. There is an awful lot of patient and sufferer blaming in this regard and one of the myths is that people lost weight this would be fixed and it is important that we dispel that myth.

The Minister knows what I will say next. We are doing fantastic work on the Joint Committee on International Surrogacy and witness after witness has come in and said we need to legislate for international surrogacy in the AHR Bill and we need to do so urgently. The best way to safeguard the interests of women who would be surrogate mothers, regardless of where they live and the best way to preserve the rights and interests of everybody involved in the surrogacy journey, is to provide legislation for it. The New Zealand Law Commission has contacted us and it has done extensive work and reviews. It has a comprehensive solution that will assist us and that should inform us. We need to expand section 7 to include international surrogacy. This has been said by witnesses ranging from the likes of the Children's Rights Alliance and by the Ombudsman for Children. These are not people who would be perceived to be biased but who are truly objective in this space. We have to be brave and legislate retrospectively as well. It is reasonable that we set a high threshold but we have to ring-fence those children who have already been born via surrogacy.

There are also anomalies arising from the Children and Family Relationships Act that still have not been dealt with, such as the fact that same-sex couples are denied rights and a full legal parental relationship with their children, which is aligned to surrogacy and yet is not anything the same. In those instances, if these people had their fertility journeys abroad they are being denied those rights in Ireland. There are issues such as that that the Minister has a unique opportunity to bring home in his Bill to make us a world leader in safeguarding the rights of everybody on fertility journeys and to ensure that Ireland is setting a standard worldwide in it. We have a unique opportunity to do that.