Surrogacy lawyer Stephen Page said revelations that baby Gammy’s biological father has a history of child sex offences is a clear argument for improved regulation of the industry.

Australian parents who have a child born to a surrogate overseas are subject to a check by the Department of Immigration and Border Protection to determine the child’s eligibility for citizenship, but not whether the parents have a criminal history.

Mr Page said it was a loophole that should be closed by imposing criminal record checks in Australia before intended parents engage a surrogate overseas.

"We need to have clear rules between countries so an intended parent can go to a place like Thailand for surrogacy and they have pre-approval from Australia to say they have a clean criminal history," he said.

Australian parents adopting a child from overseas or domestically must undergo strict background checks. Australian couples undergoing IVF also undergo criminal checks in Victoria.

Peter Illingworth, a fertility specialist with IVF Australia, said the introduction of background checks in Victoria has been controversial.

"Just because you are struggling to have a baby doesn’t make you a criminal," he said. "This horrible case from Thailand is very different."

Mr Page, of Harrington Family Lawyers in Brisbane, said the vast majority of Australians using foreign surrogates simply wanted a baby, and that Australians were the highest per capita users of international surrogacy.

Rachel Oakeley, a fertility law specialist with Bannerman Solicitors, said it was time the government lifted the ban on commercial surrogacy in Australia.

"There is a good reason for all of the attorneys-general to consider very carefully whether some element of reimbursement for surrogate mothers should be permissible within Australia," she said.

"If more cases like Gammy’s are to be avoided in future, careful consideration of the benefits of properly regulated commercial surrogacy within the Commonwealth must now happen."

University of Technology, Sydney law professor Jenni Millbank described Australian surrogacy law as a "blunt and useless instrument if the goal is to protect the rights and interests of all parties involved in surrogacy arrangements" in a paper published in Bioethical Inquiry.

She proposed that Australian surrogates could either be paid a minimum wage akin to an industrial award or given "reasonable compensation".

Altruistic surrogacy is legal in Australia but in 2010-11 there were only 16 recorded surrogacy births here, compared with hundreds of cases in Thailand and India.

The Department of Immigration and the Department of Foreign Affairs were approached for comment.