A couple have lost custody of their baby daughter to the surrogate mother who gave birth to her. After paying ?7,000 for the baby, they have been left with nothing but heartache — and an empty crib.
To add insult to their injury, they have also been ordered to hand over more than ?500 a month maintenance for the child for the next 18 years.
They feel bitter and conned — and it is easy to see why. Today, they face the awful prospect of paying for someone else to raise the baby girl they desperately wanted and will now never see.
Battle for baby: A surrogate mother has won the right to keep the child she gave birth to, leaving the couple who paid her ?7,000 to have their daughter heartbroken
Yet have they only got themselves to blame for this awful mess?
The father, who works as a chef and cannot be named for legal reasons meant to protect the baby’s identity, has said he will appeal against the decision by the Child Support Agency.
In the meantime, this is one of those situations that no one can win — least of all the innocent baby girl! — and which is fraught with complicated feelings of entitlement on all sides.
How did we get here? The husband already has a teenage daughter from an earlier relationship, while the wife has three children from a previous marriage. Since then, she has had cancer of the uterus, with a prognosis that meant it would be unlikely that she could have another baby.
Yet the couple decided that their happiness could not be complete until they had a child together. During the years they tried for a baby, the wife suffered six late-stage miscarriages, including four sets of twins.
One can only imagine the emotional devastation this caused, but at no point did the couple consider that nature was conspiring against them. At no point did they give in gracefully, sit back and count their blessings, consoling each other with the thought that perhaps it was just not meant to be.
Celebrity surrogates: It's easy for Matthew Broderick, and Sarah Jessica Parker, seen here with their son and surrogate daughters to afford the long process of surrogacy, says Jan
On and on they plunged, eventually surfing a surrogate website that promised the answer to their prayers. There, they found a single mother-of-two on benefits who was willing to carry the baby they longed for. Her womb was for sale. Hurry, hurry, step right up! And so they did.
At first, all parties bonded. They even lived together for a while. And any doubts the couple had about the filthy state of the mother’s own house, the unruly, unkempt nature of her children, or her increasing demands for more money, were pushed to the back of their minds.
They were consumers, they had made this baby to order and they were desperate.
They were also in unchartered waters, unprotected by the law in a country where formal surrogacy agreements are legal, but not binding in court. A typical British fudge, unhelpful to everyone — and which means that the parents are always at the mercy of the surrogate.
And as we now know, at the last minute, this particular surrogate mother changed her mind. As he is the natural father, the chef will have to pay maintenance until the child is 18, whether he wants to or not.
The couple have my sympathy, but I doubt whether it is ever morally right to buy or sell a baby like this.
Making it look easy: Angelina Jolie sets an example that adopting her children Maddox (left), Zahara (centre) and Pax was an easy process, argues Jan
At its most basic, surrogacy allows the commercial exploitation of poor but fertile women by rich infertile women — never the other way round, of course. Or by same-sex male couples who want to be fathers, like Elton John and David Furnish.
At its best, when everything goes according to plan, a surrogacy arrangement can be an act of altruism that brings great joy, but do we really want a womb and a baby to be the subject of cold-hearted commercial transaction?
Today, if you have enough money, you can buy anything. For the wealthy, no natural barrier exists to thwart desire, there is no gulf to breach between what they want and what they get. Women in their 50s and 60s who want IVF? No probs! Madonna and her adopted Malawi babies, Brad and Angelina’s rainbow brood? Would you like those gift-wrapped, madam?
Sarah Jessica Parker and Nicole Kidman with their surrogacies? Ker-ching! All high-profile examples of babies bought, in one way or another, by those who are protected by battalions of lawyers, secrecy agreements and big cash payments.
But if you are a couple like our foiled parents, with limited resources but unlimited quantities of desperation and innocence, anything could happen. Everything could go wrong. And it did.
At the end of their baby journey, the couple now have 18 years to reflect upon the fact that — although it might have been initially more distressing — perhaps it would have been better for them to grieve for the fact that they could not have their own child and move on. To accept that the randomness and unfairness of the universe applies to them as well as everyone else.
And perhaps, also to reflect upon the good fortune they already share, in having four children between them. This is more than some infertile couples, without their means or blind determination, could ever dream of.
Most painful of all is the thought that the legacy of this sorry affair is that one baby girl will grow up with the realisation that, in the end, no one really wanted her at all.
Oxygen thief: Fearne Cotton needs to focus on her fashion, and not stealing the limelight
Next to a midwife wielding a giant sink plunger, what is the last thing a pregnant woman wants to see in the delivery room? That’s right, ladies. It is the frightsight known as Fearne Cotton.
Poor Holly Willoughby was admitted to hospital on Tuesday morning, believing she was about to give birth to her second child.
There were contractions, there was baby action and then, ugh, there was Fearne at the bedside, being all chirpy and fizzy like a hyperactive pipe cleaner. Poor Holly!
The pair have been mates for years — but you can’t help suspect that Fearne is one of those best friends who hates it when her pal gets all the attention.
So she larked about, tooting on Holly’s gas and air pipe, tweeting pictures of herself and generally spreading her germs around without a care in the world. The amazing thing is that she wasn’t in her broadcasting bikini.
In summary: No, it is not the first time Fearne has sucked all the oxygen from a room.
Yes, the baby decided to stay put until Fearne went away. And yes, further proof, if any were needed, to never trust a grown woman who wears ankle socks with dresses.
Putting on a brave face: How do celebrities seem to make such a quick 'recovery' from their mental health problems?
After a heart-breaking year, Catherine Zeta-Jones has announced she is suffering from bipolar disorder.
Many years ago, a friend of mine had a similar diagnosis. Without going into details, many terrible, terrible things happened before my friend was eventually sectioned and got the long-term help and medical care she needed.
So it is curious that after a short stay in a detox centre in New York State, Catherine’s representatives are chirping the good news that the star is fit and well and looking forward to her upcoming filming commitments. I know that my friend could not be cured with a five-day stay in a facility, even one with daily jogs and poker sessions thrown into the mix.
Either Catherine is putting a brave face on her illness and made a miraculous recovery, or something else is at the root of her troubles.
Medical health charities have been quick to compliment the actress on revealing her illness in this way. They say that there is still a lot of stigma around mental health and that when people like her speak out, it makes a big difference to the millions of others feeling alone as they face mental illness.
Yet, on the other hand, some mental health workers are becoming concerned by so many celebrities casually claiming to be bipolar, in what seems to be a lifestyle statement rather than a clinical diagnosis.
Of course, this is not to suggest that they are not suffering from mental health problems or psychiatric difficulty. Just that it might be something which is less likely to elicit public sympathy than the bipolar catch-all — such as depression or acute stress reaction.
Catherine has had a terrible time lately. Mother of two, wife of a cancer sufferer, she lives a stressful life, right in the public eye. No wonder she is suffering. Yet bipolarity is a debilitating, out-of-control illness.
This is not to say that CZ-J doesn’t have it, but I do wonder, when all these diagnoses are hurled around, how those who suffer from chronic bipolar disease are made to feel. They can’t just pick up and carry on, like so many celebrities seem to.
Oh dear, here she is, in all her ghastly glory, back in the public eye. Helen Wood is the tart with the cold heart, the vice girl who slept with Wayne Rooney and then sold the story of her three-in-a-bed encounter with the spud-faced footballer to newspapers.
Afterwards, she and her partner-in-grime ‘Juici Jeni’ did an odd thing — they issued public apologies to Rooney’s wife Coleen, who was five months pregnant with their son Kai at the time of the encounter.
Helen’s father, a university music lecturer, also apologised, saying he was ‘desperately sorry’ for his daughter’s actions. He admitted that her life had gone off the rails when she had a baby at 16 by a 17-year-old electrician. Since then, the family have become estranged and Helen (pictured) has become notorious as the biggest kiss-and-tell hooker in the North West. Her poor mum and dad. Everyone in this story is sorry, in more ways than one.
Ghastly: Prostitute Helen Wood has become notorious as the biggest kiss-and-tell hooker
Initially, Helen spun the fanciful notion that she had only become a sex worker, if you please, to put herself through college. Today, she still looks some degree off completing a degree. If you know what I mean.
And now here she is, having kissed and told again. This time, the man in the four-poster frame is an actor. Helen knows this because he told her so, before calling himself Drew and declining to say whether he was married or not.
Afterwards he didn’t leave a tip, unless you count giving Helen a recommendation for a local restaurant. How fabulously middle-class of him. Perhaps he could have also passed on some tips for steaming asparagus and the best route to Cornwall, avoiding the Easter traffic?
Now the famous actor, who is married with a child, has obtained an injunction to protect his identity. The High Court gagging order is another example of how this country is becoming obsessed with the privacy of celebrities, when it is freedom of speech that is really at stake.
No one comes out of this tawdry little episode well. However, I do loathe Helen’s casual cruelty, not just in attempting to expose the actor for financial gain, but saying that he was disgusting because he ‘kissed like a virgin’.
The moral of the story? There isn’t one. However, if you are a famous star seeking the company of girls like Helen, then my advice is this: tip big, tip well — and tip in cash.
Ed Miliband removing the first class livery from his train seat before a television interview.
David and Samantha Cameron drinking in a crummy Spanish bar on their ‘budget’ holiday.
That ‘bigoted woman’ Gillian Duffy ambushing Nick Clegg in Rochdale this week, with the connivance of local Labour politicians.
All empty gestures, all crummy stunts, all publicity capers meant to paper over the cracks and boost their standing with the public.
Please. Stop treating us like idiots. We deserve better than this.
I think it is safe to say that Fern Britton’s new chat show is not an enormous success. In fact, as ratings continue to plummet, the show is facing the axe.
This did not stop our intrepid heroine from doing the splits live on air this week. While wearing a pair of fishnet tights.
Memo to Fern. Nothing is going to save your show. Especially not that.
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Mum-to-be: Jenni enjoys a pregnant pause on the sands of Grenada
Source of pleasure: Jenni stayed at the source Resort in Grenada
Island Of Spice: Grenada is a lush isle of rainforest and fruitfulness
Having a great night? Fearne Cotton sought to benefit itself that she left The Box nightclub with his arms over his head
Joy for baby: Holly Willoughby gave birth to her second child last week, a girl named beautiful wire 
