Asked by: Baroness Jenkin of Kennington (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government why they do not centrally hold data on the number of Parental Orders awarded each year through the Family Court for England and Wales in cases of surrogacy (1) where the child was born abroad through a commercial surrogacy arrangement, and (2) where the child was born in the United Kingdom through a surrogacy arrangement in which the mother uses her own egg.
Answered by Lord Bellamy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The number of these orders is not recorded centrally. The current recording system only collates data on the total number of parental orders made and there is no capability to break the data into further sub-sets of the different types of surrogacy arrangements. Such information can only be obtained through individual analysis of court files at disproportionate cost since they would require a manual search of court records. The Government has no plans to record this information centrally, doing so would require fundamental changes to existing IT systems.
You will be aware that in March 2023 the Law Commission of England and Wales published a joint report with the Scottish Law Commission; “Building families through surrogacy: a new law". The report puts forward recommendations for a robust new system to govern surrogacy in the UK, including recommendations specifically for the family court system.
The Government is currently considering all of the recommendations within the report and will publish a full response in due course. If and when further action is taken in response to the report, we will consider the collection of data in this area rather than risk making piecemeal changes.
Asked by: Baroness Jenkin of Kennington (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to collect and publish data on the number of Parental Orders awarded each year through the Family Court for England and Wales in cases of surrogacy (1) where the child was born through a commercial surrogacy arrangement abroad (2) where the child was born in the United Kingdom through a surrogacy arrangement in which the surrogate mother uses her own egg, and (3) where a child was born through surrogacy in this country using the egg of a third party egg donor, and not the egg of the commissioning female parent.
Answered by Lord Bellamy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The number of these orders is not recorded centrally. The current recording system only collates data on the total number of parental orders made and there is no capability to break the data into further sub-sets of the different types of surrogacy arrangements. Such information can only be obtained through individual analysis of court files at disproportionate cost since they would require a manual search of court records. The Government has no plans to record this information centrally, doing so would require fundamental changes to existing IT systems.
You will be aware that in March 2023 the Law Commission of England and Wales published a joint report with the Scottish Law Commission; “Building families through surrogacy: a new law". The report puts forward recommendations for a robust new system to govern surrogacy in the UK, including recommendations specifically for the family court system.
The Government is currently considering all of the recommendations within the report and will publish a full response in due course. If and when further action is taken in response to the report, we will consider the collection of data in this area rather than risk making piecemeal changes.