Radio Review: The Body Politic – Surrogacy

Sonia Sodha's podcast series, The Body Politic, explores the intersection of bioethics, bodily autonomy, life, and death. The first episode, Surrogacy, tackled surrogacy in the UK and involved a variety of interest-holders, including intended parents, a surrogate, and two critics of the practice. With this range of speakers presumably ensuring some sort of balance in views, however, I would have liked to have heard from more surrogates, researchers and healthcare professionals.

The podcast starts by introducing a single dad through surrogacy, whose baby is one of a tiny proportion born through surrogacy, fewer than one in 1000. Sodha describes the Law Commissions' reform project, before speaking with Helen Gibson, a staunch critic of surrogacy and egg donation, among other things. Gibson set up Surrogacy Concern as she felt the Law Commissions' project had not substantially engaged with the public. Gibson describes her efforts as focusing on raising public awareness of surrogacy and how it operates in practice.

Sodha moves on to introduce Michael Johnson-Ellis, a dad through surrogacy and the founder of My Surrogacy Journey, and Caroline, the surrogate who gave birth to his children. Caroline is the only surrogate interviewed in this episode, a weakness in my eyes. We hear her positively discuss her surrogacy journeys, as well as criticise the hospital's inadequate policy for surrogate births. Caroline ends by asserting her right to bodily autonomy, wondering why others are able to have a say in what she decides to do.

Gibson then counters this claim, using the argument that the government has outlawed certain bodily decisions, like selling a kidney. She questions whether women can consent to surrogacy, and states that it's not their responsibility to 'fix' the infertility of others, notwithstanding the societal pressure to be kind and 'pay it forward.' She continues, claiming that Britain is an outlier with its tolerant legal framework, looking to the prohibitive approach that dominates European countries.

Sodha then shifts to describing how surrogacy is an option that is chosen by women, and not just gay men. She talks to Mary Seery Kearney, an Irish senator that struggled immensely with her fertility. Without a legal framework in Ireland, Kearney engaged in a transnational arrangement. Sodha jumps in here to (mistakenly) explain that the UK's altruistic model does not allow surrogates to be paid, countering this with the commercial model seen in Georgia, Ukraine, and the USA. (In reality, only some US states allow commercial surrogacy.) Kearney started her journey in Ukraine, but moved to India when it became clear the clinic was engaging in unethical practices. Sodha asks Kearney if she was comfortable that her surrogate in India wasn't being exploited, and Kearney answers as truthfully as she can, saying that was the case, as far as she could check.

We then hear from Johnson-Ellis as he describes why My Surrogacy Journey set up a Mexico branch. He goes on to explain how surrogates in Mexico are making a 'life-changing' sum of money (US$16–18k) that all the parties agree on, which allows him to confidently say My Surrogacy Journey mitigates the risk of exploitation. He juxtaposes this approach to the commercial (US) model, where he (mistakenly) claims money is the motivating factor. In reality, empirical research reveals that surrogates in the USA (like those in the UK) are not financially motivated. Sodha correctly picks up on the ethics of paying a 'life-changing' sum of money.

Surrogacy is not a left/right issue: Kearney is a Fine Gael politician, meaning a member of a centre-right party, yet she began advocating for law reform in Ireland, after her surrogacy experience revealed flaws with the current system, namely that she is a legal stranger to her child. Gibson holds herself out as left-wing, but adopts a socially conservative view on surrogacy, describing her admiration for the Italian government's ban on surrogacy. Gibson, like Sodha, attended an event on surrogacy hosted by a network of radical feminists.

At this event, Olivia Maurel, an outspoken critic of surrogacy, spoke about the harms of the practice. Born through a transnational gestational surrogacy arrangement, Maurel described how she always knew her birth story was shrouded in secrecy, claiming she couldn't even ask her mother her age. When Maurel's mother-in-law gifted her with a DNA test, it confirmed her suspicions. She attributes her tragic history of well-being problems to being born through surrogacy and the accompanying trauma of abandonment and rejection. However, research does not support this claim.

After describing the risks associated with surrogacy, Sodha enumerates some of the Law Commissions' proposed reforms, describing how they actively encourage domestic surrogacy, treating it as another form of reproductive medicine. Sodha ends the podcast by asking her guests whether there is a right to have a child. The single dad through surrogacy, introduced in the first episode, said there's a right to not be impeded from having a child. Maurel is of the opinion that the desire to build a family is fine, but cannot be placed above human rights. Johnson-Ellis is the most liberal, arguing for a right to be a parent and access to reproductive medicine to fulfil this desire. Sodha's view is that it's not ideal to create babies separated from their birth parent, but that would mean fewer people would experience the joys of parenthood.

The podcast provided a cursory overview of surrogacy, however, I felt it was insufficiently researched and less nuanced when tackling some of the thornier issues around surrogacy. While Sodha mentions some of the pressing issues with surrogacy, especially transnational arrangements, there was little engagement with how reform could mitigate the risks of exploitation.

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The past, present and future of surrogacy law will be discussed at the free-to-attend online event 40 Years of the Surrogacy Arrangements Act: What Next for Surrogacy?, taking place on Wednesday 16 July 2025.

Find out more and register here.