Intended parents should get legal status from birth, says British surrogacy review

Law commissions for England, Wales and Scotland recommend update to 40-year-old surrogacy law

The intended parents of a child born to a surrogate mother should be able to get legal parenthood from the point of its birth, a government-commissioned review of the existing laws in Britain has concluded.

The couple who will raise the child must currently wait at least six weeks to become the legal parents, but in practice they often wait for up to a year to go through the courts. In a joint report, published on Wednesday, the Law Commission of England and Wales and the Scottish Law Commission say the effect is that the intended parents cannot make any decisions in respect of the child, including with respect to medical treatment.