New law seeks to redefine family

Ed: Notice this: "We have found persuasive evidence that a loving, supportive family network is more important than the gender of the second parent". What evidence, where?

[...] One statement from the report is especially suggestive: “The draft Bill seeks to take a new approach to parenthood, moving towards the concept of parenthood as a legal responsibility rather than a biological relationship.”

What’s that meant to mean? Potentially, it is the reworking of the whole idea of a family. Can one half of a lesbian couple be named on a baby’s birth certificate as the “father” of a child? That was one scenario raised by the Bill and it still hasn't been discounted – which would make a birth certificate less a statement of fact than a record of aspiration. Is the lesbian partner of a child’s biological mother its social parent? At present, a lesbian who approaches an IVF clinic to have a baby does so as an individual; the new law will enable two lesbians to do so as a couple – a mother and a quasi-father.

Does such a woman have to have account of her prospective baby’s “need for a father”? That used to be the case by law. Now the committee says that what she actually needs to take into account is its need of a second parent. Or, as the committee put it: “We have found persuasive evidence that a loving, supportive family network is more important than the gender of the second parent . . . in an area such as this, the law has symbolic value. Ultimately, the issue is one of what is in the best interests of the child.” Read more

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