What is a Registered Surrogacy Organisation?
On the 29th March the Law Commission and the Scottish Law Commission revealed their Full Report, announcing their recommendations for Government. My Surrogacy Journey have a copy of the summary report to review in advance of the announcement. For your copy click here.
Within the report, one of the main recommendations is the creation of Regulated Surrogacy Organisations (RSO’s).
The RSO’s main role is to support all the parties to the surrogacy agreement, and act as the gatekeepers to the new pathway. The RSO will assess whether a surrogacy agreement meets all of the eligibility conditions and the screening and safeguarding requirements, and they will decide whether to sign the Regulated Surrogacy Statement so that the agreement can proceed on the new pathway.
RSOs, like My Surrogacy Journey, will be non-profit making organisations, to ensure that our decisions are not influenced by commercial considerations.
Regulation
It is recommneded that RSOs will be regulated by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (the HFEA), the body which currently regulates fertility clinics and maintains the register containing information about donor- conceived people. The HFEA would grant a licence to RSOs, if satisfied they meet the licence conditions, which would enable them to operate; we recommend that RSOs should be subject to the same sanctions that currently apply to other bodies regulated by the HFEA, in the event that they breach their licence conditions.
The Full Report also recommend that the HFEA creates a Code of Practice for surrogacy, to guide RSOs and ensure that they function in a way that achieves the best outcomes for surrogate-born children, surrogates, and intended parents.
In addition to the role overseeing agreements on the new pathway, RSOs will also have duties to keep records that relate to surrogacy agreements on the new pathway. The RSO must transfer these records to the HFEA within 12 weeks of the birth of a child from the surrogacy agreement, once all of this information is available. The HFEA will add the information to a new Surrogacy Register which surrogate-born people will be able to access when they are older.
