Legislation covering artificial insemination introduced

Press, 25 August 1986, Page 4

Legislation covering artificial insemination introduced

By OLIVER RIDDELL in Wellington

Children bom as a result of artificial insemination and the transfer of an egg from an ovary to a fallopian tube together with semen are covered by a new legislation introduced in Parliament The Status of Children Amendment Bill has been referred to Parliament’s Justice and Law Reform Select Committee for consideration and public comment.

The intention is to clear up the status of children conceived through modern birth techniques such as in vitro fertilisation.

The legislation follows up work done by the Justice Department in recent years, which culminated in an issues paper, “New Birth Technologies,” last year.

Public submissions have been made on this paper, and the Government will release a summary. An inter-departmental committee is being set up to gather information on new birth techniques, to monitor the issues, and advise the Government.

Further legislation is likely to be required.

The bill makes no reference to access to information about any donor, and neither facilitates nor prevents such access.

The Government is seeking broadly based community support for the detail of the legislation.

“There may be people in the community who oppose this bill simply because they are opposed to the birth technologies,” said the Minister of Justice, Mr Palmer. “I would ask them to think again.”

The essential fact was that the technologies existed and were practised. This meant that there must already be some New Zealanders in the anomalous “legal limbo” the bill sought to address.

It clarified the legal situation of certain people who had had no say in the manner in which they had been conceived, he said.

In one sense it was a technical measure, but it was a technical measure of great significance for the people concerned. The legislation clarified the legal status of children conceived through the use of donated sperm, donated ova or donated embryos, in the techniques of artificial insemination, in vitro fertilisation, and gamete intrafallopian transfer.

Artificial insemination refers to the placing of semen inside the vagina

or uterus by means other than sexual intercourse.

In vitro fertilisation refers to the fertilisation of an ovum by a sperm outside the mother’s body.

Gamete intra-fallopian transfer refers to the transfer of an ovum from the ovary to the fallopian tubes, together with semen.

The legislation provides that six rules apply when donated gametes are used In any of these techniques.

Where donated sperm is used, either as sperm or in an embryo, the mother’s husband is the legal father of the resulting child, provided he consented to the procedure. : p.. -S.

Where a donated ovum is used, either as ovum or as an embryo,-the woman who bears the child is the legal mother of the child. The donors of sperm or ova . are excluded from legal parenthood.

The consent of the mother’s husband is presumed in the absence of evidence to the contrary. Couples living In a relationship in the nature of a marriage are treated in the same way as legally married couples, and so a child is not at a disadvantage simply because of the marital status of its parents — for which it is

not responsible. If a single woman or a married woman without the consent of her husband is involved, the donor of the sperm remains the legal father of the child, but has no rights or liabilities over the child unless he subsequently marries the child’s mother.

The Minister of Justice, Mr Palmer, said the need for the legislation had arisen ‘ because of. the legal relationship of the child with the sperm donor and with the mother’s husband. . ,

At present the donor of the sperm is the legal father ■— a man the child will never know — whereas the man the child does’ know cannot fulfil the rights and responsibilities of the legal father.

Mr Palmer said the husband of the child’s mother at present would commit an. offence if he registered the birth of the child as his own, knowing that the child had been conceived using donated sperni.

Such a man had no legal standing to exercise rights over a child, such as consenting to a change of name, consenting to adoption, or consenting to the child’s marriage. He would be in no better position than a

stranger to the child in any dispute over guardianship, custody, or access with the mother.

In questions of inheritance, the child could not claim against the estate of the mother's husband, Mr Palmer said. - Where a donated ovum was used, the child’s mother might be either the woman who contributed the ovum or the woman who bore the child — there was no clear legal rule.

. This meant that the law was uncertain as to which woman might register the birth of the child as hers, or who might exercise legal rights over the child. It was equally uncertain against whom, as its mother, the child might claim for the purposes of a will, intestacy, or family protection.

"These anomalous situations are clearly not in the best interests of the child,” Mr Palmer said.

Legislation was necessary to protect the children involved by giving them security with the parents in the same way children conceived in the usual way had. Legislation was also necessary to protect donors who wanted to give the gift of parenthood to others.

The need for legislation to cover this area had been recognised widely overseas, Mr Palmer said.