Surrogacy Law and Legal Parenthood

Rachel Taylor Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2026 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Taylor (North Warwickshire and Bedworth) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. I give credit to all Members, who have participated in this difficult and sensitive debate in a thoughtful and constructive manner, and particularly to my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) for leading it. I thank Adam and Jamie for starting the petition and the more than 113,000 people who signed it. Many of my constituents asked me to attend the debate today, and I am proud to do so to stand up for families created through surrogacy.

When Adam and Jamie’s daughter was born, they became her dads the moment they held her. They had chosen to become parents and had prepared for their daughter’s arrival. They had so much love to give her, but the law did not recognise them as her parents. Often parents have to go to court to prove that they are the parents of the child they are already loving and caring for. That is just not right for the parents, for the surrogates and, more importantly, for the children, and it does not reflect the reality of the families involved. It creates unnecessary stress and anguish at an already difficult time when people are raising a newborn child.

To suggest that the concept of consent can be questioned after consent has been given is dangerous. No surrogate mother enters into this relationship lightly. It is something that women consider very carefully. I have spoken to friends who would happily be surrogate mums for other families to enable them to have children, because they enjoyed the experience of pregnancy. They would be happy to help in that way, but they would consent to that in the knowledge that they would not be that child’s mum. They would expect that child to have another mother, or mothers, or other fathers. That is the basis on which they give their consent.

To take the concept of consent in legal arguments, when people make wills—they might be vulnerable people or, much of the time, elderly people—there are always questions about whether they were put under undue influence, but there are legal mechanisms to check that that was not the case. Similarly, there are mechanisms to check whether a woman has given consent for sexual intercourse. We need to strengthen checks for consent in surrogacy relationships, but we cannot have a situation where somebody can give consent, which has been adequately checked and monitored, and then withdraw it afterwards. We have to be careful about challenging that, because it goes to the very root of consent, and it is dangerous to do so.

[Rebecca Smith]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Rachel Taylor]

I would like to make some progress, and the hon. Lady has made a number of points in her own speech and in other interventions.

Same-sex couples, disabled mums or mums who simply cannot have children have gone through an incredibly demanding process to start a family, and their family is treated differently from the moment their child is born. They can be left in limbo for months while social workers carry out assessments and family courts, with already massively long delays, consider their application for a parental order. That leaves them in limbo if their child is ill, taken into hospital, starts nursery school, or any number of things. Meanwhile, they are changing nappies, comforting their baby through all the sleepless nights and making every decision about their care.

Families should not be penalised because of the gender or sexuality of the people who love and raise that child. Our surrogacy laws are more than 40 years old. Families have changed and society has changed; the law must now change too. That is why the Law Commission’s proposals are so important. They set out a new pathway through which intended parents could be recognised as legal parents from birth, rather than waiting for months to obtain a parental order.

The work has been done, the evidence has been gathered and a draft Bill has already been produced. Will the Minister listen to the families who have shared their experiences, publish the Government’s full response to the Law Commission’s report and set out a clear timetable for reform? Adam and Jamie became dads the moment they held their daughter. It is time the law recognised that reality.