Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Seery Kearney for her heartfelt, sincere, thought-provoking and personal contribution. There will be panic around Ireland if one in three fathers are not, in fact, the genetic fathers of their children. I thank her for clarifying that this statistic relates to fathers for whom a test is required as part of court proceedings. Without that clarification, there could be widespread panic across the hills and valleys of Ireland this evening. I am saddened to hear that the Senator, after years of valiant advocacy, has not availed of so much as a free coffee. Perhaps this evening, after the Bill is passed, I can buy her first coffee or, indeed, something a little stronger, given the day that is in it.

There was a long contribution regarding certain provisions in the Bill relating to intending parents. These provisions must be included because we will inevitably have some heartbreaking cases in which a couple, whether a man and a woman, two men or two women, are going through IVF treatment and surrogacy when one of them dies. Unfortunately, that does and will happen. We must legislate for posthumous assisted human reproduction. My officials and I have spent a lot of time with advocacy groups and experts working through this issue. The shared Government view, which is reflected in this legislation and, where necessary, in the amending legislation, is that if a couple are going through IVF treatment that results in the creation of embryos and the man dies, the woman can continue on her own with the treatment. She would be doing so as an intending single parent.

The question then arises as to what happens if it is the other way around. What if the woman dies? Obviously, the man cannot use the embryos himself. Can he take an embryo, which is the potential child of him and his partner, and seek help through surrogacy? Our answer is "Yes", if he is the genetic father. We are legislating for such heartbreaking cases where, in the course of the process, what was initially a couple becomes a single intending parent. Single people become parents all the time. We are also facilitating that directly through IVF and surrogacy. I repeat what I said on the previous occasion. There was a view expressed here last week that two women, two men, one woman or one man should not be parents. To clarify, I do not mean that was stated in respect of people who end up in that situation but it certainly was a view expressed in respect of the starting point for this legislation. That is a view held.