Experts say surrogates, parents and children are being failed by UK surrogacy laws, which they argue are “creaking at the seams” as demand rises sharply. Figures obtained by show there were just under 1,000 children born to surrogates in 2025, double the number in 2015, with experts linking the increase to more gay couples seeking to become parents, rising infertility and changing cultural attitudes.
Data shows applications for parental orders, usually made shortly after birth to transfer legal parenthood from the surrogate to the intended parents, reached more than 980 in 2025. Of those children, 150 were born in the UK, where surrogates can only be reimbursed for expenses, while the remainder were born abroad, mainly in the US, Ukraine, Nigeria, Georgia, Colombia and Mexico, where surrogates can be paid a fee for having a child.
Why are surrogacy agencies saying demand is rising?
UK surrogacy agencies told they were busier than ever. Helen Prosser, founder and director of Brilliant Beginnings, said they had been forced to turn away new intended parents because demand for surrogates had risen well beyond the level they could provide.
What changes were recommended to UK law?
A Law Commission review published in 2023 urged the government to update UK surrogacy law, including by giving legal parenthood to intended parents from a child’s birth. At present, the surrogate must be listed on the baby’s birth certificate as the mother, and intended parents must apply for a parental order after birth, a process that can take months. Experts say this can be distressing for the new family and can deter prospective surrogates who do not want to be a child’s legal mother.
The lawyers also recommended tighter regulatory oversight of surrogacy agencies, along with pre-conception medical and safeguarding screening. The recommendations were accepted and helped shape a draft bill, but the government has said it is not a legislative priority.
Prof Nicholas Hopkins, the review’s author, said the best way to stop intended parents going abroad, where arrangements can be riskier and less well regulated, was to ensure there was a properly regulated scheme in the UK.
His co-author, Prof Gillian Black, said there are also cases where a child has needed hospital treatment but only the surrogate has been able to legally consent.
“That doesn’t reflect the reality on the ground where the child’s being cared for and living with the intended parents. The surrogate doesn’t want that responsibility at all,” she said.
How do international surrogacy laws differ?
There is significant global disagreement about the ethics of surrogacy. The UK permits an “altruistic” model, while countries such as the US, Mexico and Nigeria allow women to be surrogates for money. France, Germany, Italy and Spain are among the countries that heavily restrict or ban surrogacy.
Reem Alsalem, the UN’s special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, has called for surrogacy to be abolished globally, describing it as a “system of violence, exploitation and abuse against women”. She argues it leaves women and girls who are “impoverished, destitute and affected by crisis and conflict” open to exploitation by people from “western wealthier states”.
Hopkins said that while the draft bill remains in parliament, the “significant” problems identified in the review will continue and more parents will choose overseas surrogacy, where there may be a greater risk of exploitation or legal complications.
Prosser said the “murkiness” in the current legal system was putting off surrogates and pushing more prospective parents abroad.
“In some places, it’s a bit of a wild west,” she said. “There are language barriers and sometimes difficulties having a relationship with the surrogate, to say nothing of the risks to the surrogate as well.
“Our frustration is we could make it easier here in the UK for people to stay here, but the law reform has been parked.”
Could political concerns delay reform?
Prof Kirsty Horsey, who researches surrogacy regulation at Loughborough University, fears that “culture wars” concerns may be influencing the government’s hesitation to move ahead with legislative change, given the issue’s growing controversy.
Her recent report, in the UK: Myth busting and reform 10 years on, said the law was “creaking at the seams” and contained unnecessary barriers that were contributing to transnational surrogacy increasingly taking place in jurisdictions where neither surrogates nor parents have legal protections.
She said people do not always realise that if they have a baby through surrogacy in a country where it is illegal, or enter into complex multi-jurisdictional arrangements, they could struggle to obtain legal parenthood when they return.
New Zealand, Australia, Ireland and Canada are changing their approaches to better reflect who the intended parents are, make it easier for people to access trustworthy sources of information, and “send the message to citizens that there are good, well-regulated ways of doing surrogacy on home soil”, she said.
A UK couple facing a lengthy court battle to become parents of their baby born via surrogacy recently launched a petition to change the law so intended parents are recognised from birth. It gathered more than 100,000 signatures, the threshold for a parliamentary debate, within days.
What are parents and surrogates experiencing now?
Rachel Westbury, who runs the surrogacy agency Nappy Endings and has been a surrogate multiple times, said the current waiting time for intended parents using her service was about three years.
“A lot of people have been through enough heartbreak and the waiting is difficult,” she said. “So we get couples looking at all different places [globally] just to try and quicken the process. People are so desperate.
“We really do have a huge surrogate shortage in the UK, because of the restrictions.”
Westbury said there needed to be more education about surrogacy in the UK and the different reasons people turn to it, including a rise in people having cancer treatment at a young age which leaves them unable to have children.
“We’ve had midwives look intended parents up and down and tell them to leave the hospital because they’re not the ones carrying the baby, even though it’s their baby being carried. I think that lack of education is probably scary to people,” she said.
