The High Court ruled that the genetic mother of twins born through a surrogacy arrangement could be recognised as their legal mother, holding that the presumption that the woman who gives birth is the mother can be rebutted after IVF. The judgment did not resolve damages or settle the final form of the order; the judge invited further submissions on those matters and costs.
The twins’ married parents, identified in the judgment as OR and CR, used CR’s ova and OR’s sperm. The embryos were implanted in CR’s sister, who carried and gave birth to the twins. The parties intended that the children would be raised by OR and CR, and that is what happened. The sister was registered as the mother and OR as the father. A request to correct the register, supported by DNA evidence, was refused by the registration authorities.
The applicants sought declarations that CR was the twins’ mother and that the refusal to recognise her and OR as their parents was unlawful. They argued that genetic parentage, their family life and the children’s rights supported the declarations. The State respondents argued that Irish law treated the woman who gave birth as the mother, and that any change to that position should be made by the legislature.
Justice Henry Abbott concluded that the Latin principle *mater semper certa est*—that motherhood is certain from birth—had become an irrebuttable presumption before IVF, when birth and genetic maternity coincided. He held that the principle did not prevent an inquiry into genetic maternity after IVF. The judgment found that chromosomal DNA remained determinative of identity and inherited characteristics despite the effects of pregnancy, and that treating genetic maternity differently from paternity would be unfair in the circumstances.
The court granted declarations in the forms sought in the first two parts of the claim. It did not, in the passage granting relief, direct the registrar to amend the birth register. The judge said the genetic mother should be registered as mother under the Civil Registration Act, but left the form of the order for further submissions.
The judgment also addressed reporting. The proceedings were to be heard otherwise than in public, but three named newspapers could attend and report subject to restrictions. The applicants’ identities were protected; evidence from two applicants and the notice party was to remain private, and contemporaneous social media reporting by designated reporters was barred.