I am a member of the special committee that was established to make recommendations on legislating for international surrogacy. We are working hard to a really tight timeframe to make that happen. In our committee room, stories have been shared and tears have been shed. We have heard from legal experts, international experts, researchers, psychologists and medics, and we have heard the extremely personal stories of families who are family because of surrogacy, of children, now adults, who were born through surrogacy and of women who have given the gift of life to other families. Yesterday, however, those stories, those tears, that hard work and those expert witnesses were all undermined by a single Seanad contribution by the Minister for Health. Can the Minister, on the record of the Dáil, confirm the Government’s commitment to legislating for international surrogacy?

First, I recognise the really important work that has been done by the Deputy and her colleagues on that committee and the hugely significant testimony that has come in from so many experts, but particularly from families in terms of what surrogacy means to them. As the Deputy knows, the reason this committee was established was because the Government identified that this issue is critical, it is complicated and we want to get the legislation right. It is the understanding of the Government, and the reason the committee was established, that this committee would bring forward Committee Stage amendments that would be able to be added to the assisted human reproduction Bill that is moving forward and be able to resolve this issue. That is my understanding about how things are proceeding. It was on that understanding that the committee was formed.