Why is surrogacy illegal in france

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Leave a comment Your name: Email address: Comment: To help avoid automated spam please type the word 'napley' in this box: Send Reply. Blog Health and Safety - personal liability for directors operating in the built environment Melinka Berridge. Andreas White. Let us take it from here. About Our History Responsible Business. Our People Partners. The ECtHR advisory opinion was requested during the trial for a review of a final decision in the Mennesson case.

Although it is not compulsory, the Cour de cassation has chosen to comply with its recommendations Ass. Referring to the advisory opinion, the court acknowledged that it had an obligation to provide a possibility to recognize the legal parent-child relationship with respect to the intended mother.

Referring to the different means provided under French law to establish filiation, the Court considered that preference should be given to the means that allow the judge to exercise some control over the validity of the legal situation established abroad and to pay attention to the particular situation of the child.

In its opinion, adoption is the most suitable way. However, considering the specific situation of the Mennesson twins who had been involved in legal proceedings for over fifteen years, the Court admitted that neither an adoption nor an apparent status procedure were appropriate as both involve a judicial procedure that would take time.

He opposes introducing surrogate motherhood, however. Until recently public opinion was also against surrogacy, but the poll by Ifop, published in La Croix, a Catholic newspaper, found that 62 percent of French people were now in favor of it. In Greece, however, once the surrogate contract is signed, the surrogate mother is left with no rights as the adopting couple becomes the sole legally recognized parents. The committee also rejected the possibility of allowing ex-post adoption because it validates a system in which children are programmed to be abandoned at birth.

Surrogacy is radically different from adoption because adoption is an ex-post remedy for existing situations of abandonment, whereas surrogacy would create and incentivize abandonment ex-ante. Since , French courts have consistently followed this line, denying both adoption and recognition of children born abroad from surrogate mothers. Their decisions rest on the enforcement of French public order. Because surrogate motherhood is against fundamental ethical principles, this practice should not only be prohibited in France but children born abroad from surrogate mothers should also not be recognized with legal status.

Otherwise it would give rise to endless claims that France should adopt other condemnable foreign practices like polygamy and repudiation on the pretext that it is allowed abroad. On the contrary, France should have stricter rules to protect the coherence of its legal system and public policy. The courts are also concerned with the efficiency of the prohibition.

An effective prohibition is one that deters surrogacy altogether. According to the judges, recognizing foreign surrogacy would incentivize infertile couples to sidestep French law by going abroad for surrogacy services and returning afterwards with the child.