An undercover Mail on Sunday investigation has revealed troubling questions about the methods and loopholes exploited by a leading UK surrogacy agency. The investigation of the British Surrogacy Centre (BSC) owned and run by the UK’s first same-sex fathers via surrogacy, Barrie and Tony Drewitt-Barlow, also highlighted the ‘abusive’ attitude to a vulnerable would-be mother and exposed a lack of rigour in the company’s medical and legal vetting of a potential surrogate.
The evidence has persuaded an industry expert, Baroness Warnock, architect of Britain’s fertility legislation, that the way BSC operates is illegal and should be investigated. Although the company gives the impression of being British, and operating according to UK law where commercial surrogacy is illegal, they are in fact based in California where profiting from surrogacy contracts is legal. Baroness Warnock told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It seems pretty clear that they are breaking the law. I think their motive is to get around the law and they should be investigated by the authorities on that basis alone. I would like to know the details of their financial profits and I think certainly the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority should investigate their activities. This is a plain case of exploitation.’
Kim Cotton, a pioneering surrogate mother and head of the not-for-profit British surrogacy agency COTS, branded BSC’s fees ‘extortionate’ and also accused the high-profile couple of ‘exploitation’.
