Gay Dads Australia

Same-sex couples lined up to register their relationships at the Victorian Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages on Monday.

The Brumby Government’s new Relationships Register was launched by Deputy Premier and Attorney-General Rob Hulls, who said it provided couples who did not want to marry or who were unable to do so with formal recognition of their committed relationship.

John Edie and his partner, Adam, were among those couples who registered their relationship on Monday.

“It’s wonderful that the state of Victoria is now recognising same-sex relationships, and it was exciting to be among the first couples at this morning’s launch,” Edie told MCV.

“Being a New Zealander, where we’ve had the Civil Union Bill for a number of years, it’s nice to see Australia starting to catch up, and this is an important step. I would encourage all those Victorian couples in committed relationships to show support for the Register, by going in and registering.”

[Link: Original Article]

Nearly two years ago the dream of parenthood became a reality for gay Richmond couple Rodney Cruise and Jeff Chiang.

Taking out a $120,000 mortgage on their home seemed a tiny price to pay for the birth of their son, Ethan Chiang-Cruise, who arrived in January last year.

It all started in 2005.

“Jeff and I had been together for about 5 years and we both desperately wanted to have a child”, Mr Cruise said.

After watching a documentary about one of the first gay Melbourne couples to parent a child using an overseas surrogate mother, the couple engaged a surrogacy agent in California.

The agent soon introduced the pair to Kelly, a woman from a small town in Ohio who agreed to carry an embryo fertilised using a donor egg and sperm from Mr Chiang or Mr Cruise.

“We immediately became very good friends with Kelly and three months after we met she had her first IVF cycle and got pregnant straight away,” Mr Cruise said.

Mr Chiang has an Asian background and the pair, not wanting to fight over who was the biological father, used two egg donors.

One egg was from a Caucasian donor and the other had an Asian background, ensuring the child would be Eurasian regardless of its biological father.

“We haven’t told anyone who the biological father is because that is something for Ethan to find out when he’s older,” Mr Cruise said.

Mr Cruise, 41, is a lawyer and Mr Chiang, 39, works in IT.

“It’s impossible to describe the joy and excitement of seeing Ethan grow from this little baby into a toddler and learning to speak and walk, ” Mr Cruise said.

“All parents have the same feeling.  He’s the apple of our eye,” he said.

Mr Cruise said the pair did not see their family structure as unusual.

“Things are changing and we know that Ethan is growing up in an environment that is not special., it’s just one of the varieties that exists.”

GAY men are looking to India to pursue the dream of parenthood, Gay Dads Victoria says.

A surrogacy forum in Prahran tonight will explain how the country is the “new growth region” for gay singles and couples seeking fatherhood through surrogacy.

But the Australian Family Association says surrogacy “flat out denies children basic human rights”.

Gay Dads spokesman Rodney Cruise said gay men had the same desire to be fathers as straight men.

Would-be fathers used to go to the US and Canada, where commercial surrogacy was legal but expensive, he said. Paid surrogacy is banned in Australia.

“The surrogacy industry in India is mature and well-regulated,” Mr Cruise said.

“The lower costs mean the option to create a family has opened up to a much larger number of gay men.”

Surrogacy costs about $120,000 in North America compared with $40,000 in India, he said.

The Australian Family Association opposed surrogacy, AFA researcher Tim Cannon said.

“We understand lots of people want to have children, including gay men, but we believe surrogacy flat out denies children basic human rights,” he said.

Surrogate children were deprived of knowing both biological parents, which could lead to identity crises, he said.

Mr Cruise and his partner, Jeff Chiang, have a 21-month-old son, Ethan, “the best thing I’ve ever done in my whole life”.

“Gay (couples) are capable of providing all the love required to raise children,” Mr Cruise said.

Mr Cannon said the AFA was also concerned about “exploited” Indian women who “rented out” their wombs.

Mr Cruise said this was “unfair” and “patronising”, assuming women in India were less capable than Western women of informed choices.

Indian women were screened to ensure they understood the nature of surrogacy, and only mothers could be surrogates, he said.

About 40 gay couples in Victoria have had surrogate children, and many of them in Stonnington, Mr Cruise said.

Forum inquiries: gaydadsaustralia.com.au

[Link: Original Article ]

However and whenever the calling to be a dad arises, the fact is that gay men make incredibly loving, nurturing and open-minded parents. In this special report, Andrew Georgiou looks at the different roads to gay fatherhood in Australia.

Click on the images to see full size.

Doting Dads

However and whenever the calling to be a dad arises, the fact is that gay men make incredibly loving, nurturing and open-minded parents. In this special report, Andrew Georgiou looks at the different roads to gay fatherhood in Australia.

Parental instincts. Some men are born with them, for others the desire to be a gay dad kicks in later in life. Gay Dads Australia is a national group of gay men who celebrate the joys of fatherhood through online forums, social gatherings and exchange of resources on their website which has been operating for just over five years.

Rodney Cruise, 42, runs the Gay Dads Australia website which boasts over 400 members between NSW and Victoria. While Cruise and his partner 39-year-old Jeff Chiang have experienced the joys of parenting their 15-month-old son Ethan through a surrogacy arrangement they underwent in the United States, Cruise notes that gay dads across the country have fulfilled their dreams of fatherhood through a variety of scenarios.

“We have dads who have become fathers through known donor arrangements, co-parenting agreements, surrogacy and those with children through previous relationships with women”.

Each situation varies, but the fact remains: a greatly loved child is the ultimate outcome.

Surrogacy

Mostly exercised through surrogacy agencies in the United States, this process is proving to be increasingly popular with gay men in Australia with the desire to be full time dads. Surrogacy sees a gay man or gay male couple firstly choosing an egg donor through a clinic and fertilizing that egg with one of the couple’s sperm. With the assistance of a surrogacy agency, the male couple are introduced to a surrogate whom through IVF, will be implanted with the fertilized egg and carry the baby for the couple to full term. The surrogate is in no way linked to the child, leaving the biological father and his partner as the legal parents to raise the child in Australia.

In 2006 Cruise and Chiang were blessed with their first son Ethan through the assistance of US based Surrogacy agency Growing Generations, which has helped over 500 couples become parents. Their affection and connection with their chosen surrogate developed so strongly during her pregnancy with their son, Rodney and Jeff extended their family network to include Kelly into their now 15 month old son Ethan’s life.

“Even though they are in the US and we live here, Kelly and her family are now a part of ours”, says Jeff.

“Women like her, do this because they genuinely want to help people become parents”. Cruise’s partner Jeff comes from a traditional Taiwanese family which has a long history of basing family on geography rather than biology.

“Jeff’s extended family is made up of people who have descended from his parents village who are often not biologically related. When you think about it these were the first alternative families, and Jeff and I continue that tradition by creating our sense of family as loving and devoted fathers to Ethan” says Cruise.

It’s inspiring to see that a traditional Taiwanese culture can embrace the concept of gay parenting, while negative sensationalism perpetuated in the local media can feed intolerance from with Australia’s wider community. While the costs involved in becoming parents reached the $150,000 mark, Rodney and Jeff’s natural paternal instincts will see them extend their family again when the surrogate for their next child is chosen in May.

“The concept of the traditional family is rather outdated,” says Cruise, “the genetic make up of a family is irrelevant to us. We believe a family is about love.”

Known Donor

The flipside to the surrogacy scenario is the known donor situation where a gay male provides the sperm to single lesbian or a lesbian who is partnered. The basis of this arrangement sees the single or coupled lesbians raise the child with any parental rights or responsibility placed on the biological father. Individual arrangements may be made where the father sees the child throughout his or her upbringing, as either an uncle, family friend or even as dad, though the parental rights are reserved exclusively for the lesbian couple. Known donor cases are usually carried without issue as they have taken on a specific role, which takes a step back from the role and responsibilities of raising the child. 39-year-old Allan from Sydney’s inner West is the very proud known donor to nineteen-month-old Zara.

While Allan spends quality time with Zara and enjoys a close friendship with her lesbian parents, he has maintained the agreement, which sees Zara’s mothers as her full time parents. “I’m very close to the girls and Zara and see them every week. My reward for the gift I have given the girls is seeing the immense joy Zara has brought to everyone’s lives, including grandparents,” says Allan.

“I guess I am seen as a satellite figure or even uncle, and that has worked out incredibly well for all of us. All of our friends have been extremely supportive of the situation.” Last month the NSW Government made its long awaited announcement that it would commit to amending laws to give same-sex parents of children conceived through artificial fertilization the right to officially registered the names of both mothers on a child’s birth certificate.

Co-parenting

Sees the single male or gay male couple act as a co-parent, along side a single or couple lesbian. This arrangement may see a child with two mothers and two fathers, which ultimately provides a double dose of devotion and love for the child. “The biggest issue for gay dads in co-parenting is working out a reasonable arrangement with a lesbian couple and maintaining it,” say Gay Dads Australia’s Rodney Cruise. “Often couples may site down prior to the arrangement and figure out who will see the child and when.”

Many Australian children may have four heterosexual parents through divorce and new marriages, the child of four gay parents often grow up with the extended family from birth. Co-parenting may see the child living with either sets of parents on a full or part time basis based upon a mutal agreement between the male and female couples.

Adoption

Adoption ofr gay singles and couples is legal in the United States, United Kingdom, South Africa, Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands, Australia has failed to catch up to speed. In 2007 a WA couple made Australian history by being the first gay couple granted the right to adopt, however since the landmark ruling no other couples have been allowed to follow suit. Though inter-country adoption between Australian and co-adoption countries such as China exist for heterosexuals, the same rights are not currently extended to gay and lesbian singles or couples wanting to adopt.

Previous relationship

Like countless other gay fathers across Australia, 45-year-old Gregory Duffy, from Sydney’s East has enjoyed the riches of
fatherhood through children born out of a previous heterosexual relationship. “I was married, in love and ultimately wanted to start a family and have children of my own,” recalls Duffy.

After the birth of his second daughter, Duffy came to terms with his own sexuality. “I came out to myself toward the end of 1993, and left the marriage when my children Victoria and Georgia were five and two-and-a-half years old. All they really knew was that Dad had left but not for a deeper reason. I did not officially come out to my wife till at least 6 months later.”

“Finally, we began to talk about a whole lot of issues we never touched on before.”

Although Duffy did not come out to his eldest daughter Victoria for another seven years, he recalls his eldest girl struggling with the decision more than his youngest.

“Victoria was quite upset and didn’t fully understand what it was for me to be gay, but after numerous long chats she slowly adjusted and actually felt it was quite cool to have a gay dad!”

Today Greg enjoys a wonderful relationship with Victoria, 19 and Georgina, 16. “Having two beautiful daughters that accept me for who I am and have never judged me for being gay has enriched our relationship. It has been an interesting and emotional journey, but to know I have had their love and support has made the road much easier to travel.”

For more information on Gay Dads Australia and advice on surrogacy go to www.gaydadsaustralia.com.

[Link: Original Article]

Meet Qona, the nine-year-old girl at the heart of an extraordinary tale of modern-day parenting.

Her birth mother lives in Sydney with her girlfriend. Her other mother, the woman she calls “mum” – the ex-girlfriend of her birth mother – raised her in New Zealand on her own.

But it’s her gay dad who will soon take responsibility for raising her.

Qona’s remarkable “rainbow” family is one of a growing trend of gay and lesbian people redefining parenthood. “We call ourselves a family,” said Qona’s dad, Mark Harrigan, a hairdresser from Newtown.

Jill Christie, her non-birth mother, agreed: “To her, this is normal – she knows her dad is gay and her mothers are lesbians.

“She knows she wasn’t created through sex – instead we tell her she was born scientifically – and she’s proud of it.”

Qona Venus Harrigan Christie was conceived in Sydney through home insemination using Mr Harrigan’s sperm. Ms Christie said she and Qona’s birth mother, Sarah (not her real name), chose Mr Harrigan because he wanted to play a hands-on role in his child’s life.

“I think if a kid has the chance to know both their mum and dad why deny them that?” she said.

“Otherwise they’ll spend the rest of their lives wondering about that unknown parent.”

Three weeks after Qona’s birth at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Ms Christie obtained a parenting order from the Family Court which granted her extensive rights as co-mother.

Qona, a Solomon Islands name meaning peaceful dove, was named after Ms Christie’s mother. Qona was also given Ms Christie’s surname.

Mr Harrigan said his daughter’s birth was the fulfilment of a lifelong dream. After Sarah gave birth, Mr Harrigan was the first person to hold the newborn. A year later – dressed in drag as “Margaret” – he held a sleeping Qona in his arms on top of the lead float in the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.

“I always knew I was going to be a father – the difficulty lay in how that would happen,” he said.

“Now I can’t believe I produced something so beautiful.”

Qona’s early years were full of change. Mr Harrigan had her every third week from the age of three months till she was 4½ years, when Sarah and Ms Christie moved back to their native New Zealand.

But just a year later the lesbian couple split and Sarah returned to Sydney, leaving Ms Christie to cope as a single mother in Wellington, a conservative town with a small gay community. Suddenly alone, she had to give up her high-powered career in health administration.

“It’s cost me a lot – my career, my relationships and financially,” Ms Christie said.

Now 55, she has decided Mr Harrigan, 39, is more able to guide Qona through her adolescent years.

As a sperm donor, Mr Harrigan has no legal rights involving major decision-making about Qona’s education, living arrangements or health. He has no liabilities either, such as child-support payments.

Last month the three parents held their first “parenting conference” and decided Qona will move back to Sydney. Ms Christie may also move in with dad and daughter, and even Sarah may play more of a role.

“With so many divorces and re-marriages it’s not that extraordinary to have three parents anyway and our sexuality has nothing to do with our parenting,” Mr Harrigan said.

Despite the unconventional nature of her upbringing, Qona, Ms Christie and Mr Harrigan said, is a stoic, self-assured little girl who is proud of her mums and dad.

“When I visit she drags me round the playground telling everyone I’m her dad,” Mr Harrigan said.

A 2006 US study found that the adolescent offspring of same-sex parents did not differ from the children of heterosexual parents in self-esteem, peer relationships, school adjustment, drug use or sexual experience. In fact, teenagers of same-sex parents coped better with prejudice and bullying.

The other important adult in Qona’s life is Mr Harrigan’s partner, John Cobban.

Mr Cobban said in the past he’s refused requests to be a sperm donor, believing a child “should have a male and female input into its life”.

Being part of Mr Harrigan’s world has changed his view.

“Meeting this unique family has opened my eyes and changed my thoughts on gay parenting,” he said.

Rodney Cruise, from Gay Dads Australia, said while lesbians had been raising children for decades, gay men actively seeking fatherhood was a relatively new trend. He said gay men usually teamed up with a lesbian couple, single lesbian or single heterosexual woman. Increasingly, though, they are using a surrogate in overseas countries and raising the child with their same-sex partner.

“Gay and lesbian people will have children and you can’t stop them,” he said. “What makes a family is love and that’s what people care about – that the kids are loved, happy and well looked after.”

Mr Cruise and his partner, Jeff Chaing-Cruise, have a son Ethan, 15 months, who was born by surrogacy in the US.

He also has a child to a lesbian couple but he doesn’t have a daily role in her upbringing. He said there is growing acceptance of same-sex couples in the wider community.

Qona is an outgoing, sporty child who has represented her school in athletics, swimming and cross-country. Ms Christie said she was hitting the age where “sex is on the agenda” and her parents would continue to be open about their sexuality.

Research shows children raised by same-sex parents are no more likely to identify as gay or lesbian in adulthood than children raised by heterosexual parents.

Ms Christie believes Qona will probably experiment with boys and girls as she grows up, but “she has a much chance as being gay as any other child”.

[Link: SMH Article]
[Link: The Age Article]
[Link: Brisbane Times]

“Swimming Against The Tide is a series of stories about Australians who have chosen to live their lives their way. Told in their own words this programme is an invitation into the lives of people who, while they fit into the society around them, are doing something a little different to the rest of us. Meet a gay couple (Rodney Cruise & Jeff Chiang) who have adopted a baby son and are loving their new found fatherhood in Melbourne”.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSayHl535HE&hl=en]

January Edition of “Notebook” Magazine featuring an article entitled “Devoted Dads” with Rodney, Jeff and Ethan Chiang-Cruise.

Rodney, Jeff and Ethan, 11 months

Attorney Rodney Cruise and his partner, Jeff Chiang, want the same things for their baby son, Ethan, as most parents. “Love, understanding, acceptance; that’s what we will give Ethan, ” says Rodney. “We want our son to grow up knowing he is loved unconditionally – and we’ll support him to become a happy, successful, well-balanced person, gay or straight, with his own family one day if he chooses”.

Rodney says his mother loved and supported him through his difficult early teenage years when he first realised he was gay. Similarly, he wants to be there for his son whatever needs may arise. “From about the age of 17, I knew I wanted to be a parent some day and I knew that being gay was going to make it more difficult. But I had a lot of things I wanted and needed to do first. Then, when I met Jeff in late 2000, one of the first things we talked about was having children. It was so exciting to meet a man who shared the same aspiration”.

Over the next five years, Rodney and Jeff considered all sorts of parenting possibilities, including co-parenting with a lesbian couple, adoption, fostering and surrogacy. Adoption is not legally possible for gay couples in Australia, unlike many Western countries. The couple felt fostering was too temporary, and co-parenting wasn’t ideal because Rodney and Jeff wanted to be full-time parents. After watching a documentary about a gay couple from Melbourne who achieved parenthood through surrogacy in the United States, Rodney and Jeff realised they had found a way.

“We registered with a surrogacy agency in the US and started saving madly for what was ahead”. The agency found them a “gestational surrogate”: a woman who is prepared to undergo IVF treatment using a fertilised donor egg and carry the pregnancy to full term. “The egg was from a donor and the sperm was from both of us. Then we waited to see if any eggs fertilised”, recalls Rodney.

Rodney and Jeff’s dream to have a child then moved forward progressively and effortlessly, as if it was meant to be. In January 2006, the pair flew to California to meet Kelly, a 29 year old mother of two from Ohio, who had agreed to act as a surrogate. The Australian couple bonded easily with the warm down to earth Kelly and her husband, Mike, and were only too happy to return to California a few months later for the first IVF treatment. Two weeks later, Rodney and Jeff’s phone range at three o’clock in the morning. “We go the news that we were pregnant, ” says Rodney, beaming with delight at the recollection. “We were so lucky to be successful on our very first go.”

Nine months later, Rodney and Jeff checked into the local maternity hospital in Ohio with Kelly and her husband to await the birth of what they knew by then, would be a son. Everyone was ragged after Kelly’s 13 hour labour, but when Ethan finally arrived everyone hugged each other with joy, including the hospital staff. “The Ohio medical team were incredibly supportive; we were so desperately excited to have a baby, says Rodney.

Today, Rodney is back at work full-time and still finds himself constantly thinking about his son in between legal work. Jeff works part-time and both dads feed, bath, change nappies, and get up in the middle of the night when required. “We both want to be involved; we both want to be the best parents we can be. Ethan doesn’t have a mum – he has two dads, but most of all he has two parents,” says Rodney. Ethan also has an ‘auntie’ in Ohio, of course, who has become a firm family friend.

Rodney and Jeff don’t foresee Ethan having a tricky childhood because of the unusual circumstances surrounding his birth. “The issues that make our lives more difficult are not social,” explains Rodney. “What is most frustrating is the institutionalised discrimination that occurs as a result of Australian law. This country simply does not recognise Ethan, Jeff and I as a ‘family’ in the normal way”. The couple have recently applied for a Parental Responsibility Order from the Family Court, which will grant them the right to make major decisions about the care of their child. It is not exactly the same as parental status, but it does prescribe who is responsible for Ethan, and most importantly, it grants equal rights to a non-biological father who is part of a gay couple.

“If Ethan is admitted to hospital, for example, and needs urgent treatment, we wouldn’t be able to make critical decisions about our son’s wellbeing as a result [without a Parental Responsibility Order]. There are thousands of same-sex parent families in Australia who suffer this discrimination and in all cases, it’s the children who suffer. But who knows? Perhaps Jeff, Ethan and I can lobby for things to change,” says Rodney.

For the time being, Rodney and Jeff enjoy being a family , and like most proud parents, they’re wide-eyed with pride and love as they watch their smiling boy learn to cuddle, communicate and crawl. “We won’t hide anything from Ethan, “says Rodney as he, Jeff and Ethan snuggle together on the living-room sofa for a group hug. “We will always tell him everything he wants to know”.

[Link: Original Article]

When a daddy and a daddy love each other very much … More gays and lesbians are becoming parents, despite the obstacles in their way. Peter Munro reports.

NEXT month Rodney Cruise will become a father for the second time without having had sex with a woman. By then, it will be nine months since his first child, Ethan, was born to a surrogate in the United States, and Cruise and partner Jeff Chiang together cut the umbilical cord. They flew home to Melbourne as a family when Ethan was 11 days old, and three days later Cruise successfully donated his sperm to a lesbian couple who are close friends of theirs and who are now expecting their first child in four weeks.

Cruise, 41, a patent attorney, came out as gay when he was 13, but it is his new role as a father that attracts attention. “We both wanted to be parents and didn’t see our sexuality as being a bar to that; it just complicated things,” he says.

They used a surrogacy agency in California at a total cost of about $150,000, including flights and accommodation and $35,000 for their surrogate Kelly, from Ohio. They plan to return to the US before Christmas to conceive another child by surrogacy.

That child will be Cruise’s third, one of a growing number of babies born of gay and lesbian parents. Victorian families with same-sex de facto partners and at least one child aged 18 or under grew by more than a third in the five years to the 2006 census. Across Australia, there were almost 2400 families with at least one gay or lesbian parent, a jump of about 26 per cent.

If anything, these figures grossly underestimate actual numbers of gay and lesbian families, many of which are not comfortable publicly divulging details of their sexuality. But they offer a good guide to the increasingly pink face of Australian families. The most startling jump in Victoria was in gay families with preschool children, with the number of declared same-sex families with children aged four or under more than doubling to 167.

Dr John McBain, director of Melbourne IVF and head of reproductive services at Royal Women’s Hospital, says there is a growing acceptance of same-sex families in the wider community. “I think the public is much more tolerant now of lesbian couples becoming parents,” he says. “People are far more aware that lesbian couples are loving couples in relationships as stable as heterosexual ones and that they make good parents.”

Shifting public perceptions have also favoured single women wanting to start a family. Surveys show that from 1993 to 2000, the number of people who approved of the use of donor sperm to help single women conceive more than doubled to 38 per cent. Almost a third supported the use of donor sperm by gay couples, compared with only 7 per cent in 1993.

Both groups of women have sought to start families through the Royal Women’s sperm storage bank, where sperm from known donors is screened for communicable diseases and frozen before it is available for self-insemination. Three months ago, the screening facility celebrated its first birth from one of the 15 women to have used the service, McBain says.

Seven years ago, McBain successfully challenged Victoria’s infertility laws on behalf of a 38-year-old animal shelter worker from Box Hill South, who had tried for eight years to conceive but was refused donor sperm because she was single. The 2000 Federal Court decision, upheld on appeal to the High Court, stripped out the requirement that women must be either married or in a solid de facto relationship to access assisted reproductive technology.

But such treatment is still limited in Victoria and South Australia, alone among the states and territories, to women who are medically infertile — effectively barring both lesbian and single women who function fine but don’t plan to test out their fertility with the opposite sex.

Lori, 34, and Libby, 32, a lesbian couple in western Victoria, are among a growing number of women who have had to cross the border to make a baby. In November, they will travel to Albury for their second shot at donor insemination for Libby, a horse midwife, at a clinic that is so busy it has closed its waiting list. Each attempt costs about $1500, not including the cost and inconvenience of having to stay interstate for several nights.

Lori, a part-time teacher at a Catholic primary school, who prefers not to reveal her surname, has a 10-year-old daughter from a former heterosexual relationship. She says that gays and lesbians, like the wider community, have become more accepting of parenthood.

“When I came out eight, nine years ago, there wasn’t a lot of support for lesbian mums. It was more like, ‘Why would you have a kid when you are gay?’ And I found it really hard to fight against that stereotype,” she says. “Now there are a lot more women who are saying that in a few years’ time they would like to have a kid.”

The couple have also advertised online for a donor, who they want to play an “uncle” role with limited contact, on Maybe Baby, one of several social groups for “rainbow families” — a mixture of homosexuals, heterosexuals, bisexuals and transgenders. They have had responses from a gay male who has previously donated sperm to two lesbian couples and a heterosexual man who says he would like to help.

They are not alone in pursuing parenthood online. On one website, a 30-something, non-smoking gay couple want to be co-parents and a 31-year-old lesbian with a nine-year-old son is on the lookout for a donor who is extremely fit, healthy and handsome. A gay couple in Perth want a woman to carry their child. And on the Queensland coast, a male bisexual wants to assist a single woman or lesbian couple, promising to help pay for the child’s rearing.

Other websites include forums with hints on DIY insemination, including the tip that women should avoid hot baths before and after they insert the syringe, and another on what name children should call their gay parents — Mum and Mumma? Dad and Pop?

The Rainbow Families Council, which was established last September, gives gay and lesbian parents the chance to meet offline as well. Felicity Marlowe, who co-ordinates the council’s Love Makes a Family campaign for legal reform, says the growing visibility of same-sex parents has made more gays and lesbians consider having their own children. “Sometimes you think every second person who is queer is having a child,” she says.

“We are seeing lots more requests from child-care centres and primary schools to look at how they can become more inclusive in their policies and their curriculum, because they are seeing more families with two mums or two dads.”

Schools in Melbourne’s inner northern suburbs are particularly inclusive of the children of gay and lesbian families, she says. That might mean simply stocking library books that include same-sex parents among their characters or amending standard letters home to refer to parent/parent rather than mother/father.

It is a long way from the day in 2004 when then acting Prime Minister John Anderson publicly criticised the ABC for a Play School episode showing a young child visiting the zoo with her two mums. The Federal Government is yet to change its tune, with Prime Minister John Howard maintaining this year that having a mother and a father gave children “the best opportunity in life”.

Some sectors of the Australian public also maintain that children need a mother and father, preferably married. A spokeswoman for the Australian Family Association says: “Children need an involved, on the ground, in the house, father and mothe
r. They don’t need other mothers, adopted mothers or other fathers.”

DISCRIMINATION was among the topics discussed at a symposium on same-sex parents for medical practitioners, healthcare workers and researchers at the University of Melbourne in June.

Dr Ruth McNair, a general practitioner specialising in lesbian and women’s health and a senior lecturer in the department of general practice at the university, says prejudice remains a potent issue for many same-sex parents. Men in particular face some opposition both from among the general public and from within the gay community, where they might be tagged with the derogatory term “breeders”.

“They are often faced with comments that lesbians would have got 20 years ago,” McNair says. “Comments like, ‘Why are you selling out to the mainstream, why don’t you just continue the gay lifestyle’.”

Such catcalls are gradually fading, though, says McNair, who is on maternity leave with her four-month-old son, Samuel, whom she parents with her lesbian partner. “There has been a huge change in the community in the past 20 years. If you look at the (Sydney) Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, the first group are always the Dykes on Bikes, but the second group is now mums with prams.”

In one sense, the debate has moved on, from discussions on the concept of gay and lesbian parents to a focus on their children as they grow older. A US study last year found that the adolescent offspring of same-sex parents did not differ from the children of heterosexual couplings in self-esteem, peer relationships, school adjustment, drug use or sexual experience. The only significant difference was that the teenagers of same-sex parents coped better with prejudice and bullying.

But in another sense, the debate has stayed the same. The Australian Family Association still argues that “there is bucketloads of research” showing that children need a mother and father.

This is despite the findings of the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s final report into assisted reproductive technology and adoption, which was tabled in Parliament in June. The commission made 130 recommendations for updating Victoria’s infertility laws, including that people seeking to undergo treatment or to adopt must not be discriminated against on the basis of their sexual orientation or be excluded on the grounds that they have no partner.

The commission also recommended that Victoria scrap its “clinical infertility” bar to treatment in favour of a simple test of whether a woman, in her circumstances, is unlikely to become pregnant by any other means. Attorney-General Rob Hulls, who has sat on the report for several months, has promised to respond before the end of the year.

Cruise and Chiang first told the story of Ethan’s birth to The Age in April and on the same day they were stopped in the street by a woman who thanked them for showing that her own gay son might one day give her a grandchild. “When I was young, I always wanted to be a parent but I couldn’t see how it could happen. Now there is a sense within the gay community than we can have it too and why should we be denied it,” Cruise says.

“Most parents want to be grandparents one day and we look forward to the day when Ethan, whether gay or straight, becomes a dad as well.”

[Link: Original Article]

THE champagne was popping, the roses were red, and the couple was happy – and gay.

Yesterday, Jeff Chiang and Rodney Cruise were Victoria’s first gay couple to sign a relationship register.

They celebrated the event yesterday as Yarra Council launched its Relationship Declaration Register, which offers to record same-sex and mixed-sex relationships.

* Park damaged: Midsumma festival costly

While signing the register will not give the Richmond couple the rights of marriage, they’re hoping it’s a small step towards more rights as parents of their son Ethan.

With friends gathered, the couple used the Fitzroy Town Hall launch to exchange commitment vows.

In front of civil celebrant and fellow gay father Jason Tuazon-McCheyne, Mr Cruise and Mr Chiang promised to be faithful and loving.

“You are my best friend, my lover, and the father of my son Ethan,” they said to each other. “I now proudly take your hand as you have taken my heart.”

During the ceremony, Yarra Council mayor Jenny Farrar told how the couple had mortgaged their home and travelled to the United States to have baby Ethan through IVF and surrogacy.

Ethan is the biological son of one of the men, but the couple preferred not to know which one.

Under Australian law, however, the non-biological father is not allowed to formally adopt.

“It’s a terrible situation to be in, that one of us doesn’t have parental rights,” Mr Cruise said. “Queer families — ‘rainbow families’ — are on the increase, which means a lot of children aren’t protected by their parents having rights.”

Mr Chiang held four-month-old Ethan during the ceremony.

Yarra Council voted unanimously to introduce the Relationship Register earlier this year, following the lead of Melbourne City Council.

Last month, the State Government also bowed to pressure from councils and lobby groups, promising to introduce a statewide register by the end of the year.

[Link: Original Article]

Transcript – Stateline Victoria – “Government considering widespread remorms to the state’s IVF and surrogancy laws” by Cheryl Hall

JACKIE ROBINSON, MOTHER: What better proof do you need, apart from looking at them. You can tell they’re certainly —

BRETT ROBINSON, FATHER: If you look at them, you can tell they’re ours.

JACKIE ROBINSON: Certainly Brett’s.

BRETT ROBINSON: Chad’s more like me and Todd’s more like you.

CHERYL HALL, REPORTER: Brett and Jackie Robinson are the proud parents of twin boys, Chad and Todd. Using their own eggs and sperm, the boys were conceived through IVF. But as Jackie Robinson has explained to her sons, they were carried by a friend who acted as a surrogate mother.

JACKIE ROBINSON: Belinda, bless her, she was absolutely fantastic in what she’s done for us. Her whole idea was just to help us out to become a family and she did a fantastic job and she said that’s where it stops. When the boys are born, they’re ours and for us to raise as we see fit.

BRETT ROBINSON: We can’t thank her enough for what they’ve done. That’s great. We’re very happy.

CHERYL HALL: But the complications began even before the boys were born.

JACKIE ROBINSON: We were originally under the impression that Brett was going to be allowed to be on the birth certificate and we thought with that, we can later have me added. That didn’t worry us, just so long as one of us was on the birth certificate to start with was great. Then we found out, after Belinda was already pregnant, or carrying the boys, that they had to be a legally married couple to even go into the process, so from that day on Mark’s name is on it and neither of us got a look in.

CHERYL HALL: Under Victorian law it’s the surrogate mother, the woman who gives birth, who is listed as the mother on the birth certificate, and her husband is listed as the father. It’s created endless problems for Jackie and Brett Robinson, who have no legal parenting rights over their sons.

JACKIE ROBINSON: I actually found out when one of my boys was going in to have his tonsils out and I was just discussing with the nurse as we were carrying him in to be anaesthetized. I was saying to the nurse the size of the boys and she said, “You must have been huge,” and I said, “I didn’t actually carry them,” and I explained to her that we had a wonderful surrogate who did that for us. She said, “Do you realise you can’t admit your boy in the hospital? You have to have the surrogate’s consent because she’s the legal mother.” That really spun me out then. I thought, “That can’t be right, they’re my boys.” If we ever need to apply for passports, we have to get Belinda’s consent on almost anything, which is not right. It’s crazy. The laws are crazy.

CHERYL HALL: There’s no doubt the Robinsons are the biological parents of Chad and Todd. They’ve even had DNA tests to prove it, but it changes nothing. The legal limbo created by the current laws isn’t limited to the traditional family unit. It also affects a growing community of gay and lesbian parents who have found ways to have children. Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise spent $150,000 in the United States to have baby Ethan, through an anonymous egg donor and a surrogate mother.

JEFF CHIANG-CRUISE, PARENT: Before we had Ethan we socialised with other gay dads so we got a lot of ideas from them and got a lot of advice from them as well.

CHERYL HALL: What’s been the hardest bit?

JEFF CHIANG-CRUISE: Initially probably waking up (indistinct) but he’s being very good to us and he’s sleeping through the night for the last 1.5 months.

CHERYL HALL: One of them is the biological father; the surrogate mother is listed on the birth certificate as unknown. But the bureaucratic problems started once they arrived back in Melbourne.

RODNEY CHIANG-CRUISE, PARENT: One of us is the biological father of Ethan and one of us is the non-biological father of Ethan. The non-biological father has no parenting rights in Australia. It presents issues when applying for a passport. It could present issues if Ethan gets sick and needs medical treatment in hospital. We could be presented with problems there. But the biggest fear is if the biological father does die, Ethan actually has no parent at all, no relative at all under the law, even though he has another father.

CHERYL HALL: Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise are planning to be the first couple on the City of Yarra’s new relationship register when it opens on 7 May. They hope the council register and the one being set up by the State Government will inadvertently help the non-biological parent to adopt Ethan by providing evidence a relationship exists. But that’s a move that will be opposed by the powerful Christian lobby. They support the relationship register, as long as it doesn’t mimic marriage and doesn’t open the door to adoption or parenting rights for same sex couples.

ROB WARD, AUSTRALIAN CHRISTIAN LOBBY: The register doesn’t allow that. That would be a consequential change to other acts like the Adoption Act and so on. We feel the best interests of the child might not be served in that situation.

CHERYL HALL: Why not?

ROB WARD: The evidence seems to be pretty clear that the best interests of a child are served by having a mother and a father present, and that would be the ideal that we would be aiming for.

CHERYL HALL: If the State Government follows the interim recommendations of the Law Reform Commission, Jackie and Brett Robinson will be recognised as parents, with the surrogate’s consent. But Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise face bigger hurdles. Under the interim recommendations, they could have a child through altruistic surrogacy, but not commercial surrogacy. The Christian lobby is opposing both.

ROB WARD: I would say that there is a great deal of sympathy for infertile couples – I’m talking here married, heterosexual couples. Let me make that distinction really clear. There is a great deal of sympathy for people who are infertile. I’m not quite sure that we’re ready to rush down the road and to open the door, if you like, to surrogacy for all. Certainly not for homosexual couples.

CHERYL HALL: Can you say what you think would be best for the child in this situation?

ROB WARD: Firstly for it not to have happened. This couple, and perhaps others like them, are making a deliberate choice, a conscious decision, to bring about a child that doesn’t have proper parents in the normal sense. One wonders, down the track, what the future for that child might be, how confused that child might be about who its mother was, who its father is.

CHERYL HALL: Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise believe the community is ready to accept gay and lesbian families.

RODNEY CHIANG-CRUISE: We’ve had nothing but positive experiences. The community looks at a family and it doesn’t matter what shape it is, and if it’s happy and they see the kids are looked after and loved, that’s what matters.
: What better proof do you need, apart from looking at them. You can tell they’re certainly —

BRETT ROBINSON: If you look at them, you can tell they’re ours.

JACKIE ROBINSON: Certainly Brett’s.

BRETT ROBINSON: Chad’s more like me and Todd’s more like you.

CHERYL HALL: Brett and Jackie Robinson are the proud parents of twin boys, Chad and Todd. Using their own eggs and sperm, the boys were conceived through IVF. But as Jackie Robinson has explained to her sons, they were carried by a friend who acted as a surrogate mother.

JACKIE ROBINSON: Belinda, bless her, she was absolutely fantastic
in what she’s done for us. Her whole idea was just to help us out to become a family and she did a fantastic job and she said that’s where it stops. When the boys are born, they’re ours and for us to raise as we see fit.

BRETT ROBINSON: We can’t thank her enough for what they’ve done. That’s great. We’re very happy.

CHERYL HALL: But the complications began even before the boys were born.

JACKIE ROBINSON: We were originally under the impression that Brett was going to be allowed to be on the birth certificate and we thought with that, we can later have me added. That didn’t worry us, just so long as one of us was on the birth certificate to start with was great. Then we found out, after Belinda was already pregnant, or carrying the boys, that they had to be a legally married couple to even go into the process, so from that day on Mark’s name is on it and neither of us got a look in.

CHERYL HALL: Under Victorian law it’s the surrogate mother, the woman who gives birth, who is listed as the mother on the birth certificate, and her husband is listed as the father. It’s created endless problems for Jackie and Brett Robinson, who have no legal parenting rights over their sons.

JACKIE ROBINSON: I actually found out when one of my boys was going in to have his tonsils out and I was just discussing with the nurse as we were carrying him in to be anaesthetized. I was saying to the nurse the size of the boys and she said, “You must have been huge,” and I said, “I didn’t actually carry them,” and I explained to her that we had a wonderful surrogate who did that for us. She said, “Do you realise you can’t admit your boy in the hospital? You have to have the surrogate’s consent because she’s the legal mother.” That really spun me out then. I thought, “That can’t be right, they’re my boys.” If we ever need to apply for passports, we have to get Belinda’s consent on almost anything, which is not right. It’s crazy. The laws are crazy.

CHERYL HALL: There’s no doubt the Robinsons are the biological parents of Chad and Todd. They’ve even had DNA tests to prove it, but it changes nothing. The legal limbo created by the current laws isn’t limited to the traditional family unit. It also affects a growing community of gay and lesbian parents who have found ways to have children. Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise spent $150,000 in the United States to have baby Ethan, through an anonymous egg donor and a surrogate mother.

JEFF CHIANG-CRUISE: Before we had Ethan we socialised with other gay dads so we got a lot of ideas from them and got a lot of advice from them as well.

CHERYL HALL: What’s been the hardest bit?

JEFF CHIANG-CRUISE: Initially probably waking up (indistinct) but he’s being very good to us and he’s sleeping through the night for the last 1.5 months.

CHERYL HALL: One of them is the biological father; the surrogate mother is listed on the birth certificate as unknown. But the bureaucratic problems started once they arrived back in Melbourne.

RODNEY CHIANG-CRUISE: One of us is the biological father of Ethan and one of us is the non-biological father of Ethan. The non-biological father has no parenting rights in Australia. It presents issues when applying for a passport. It could present issues if Ethan gets sick and needs medical treatment in hospital. We could be presented with problems there. But the biggest fear is if the biological father does die, Ethan actually has no parent at all, no relative at all under the law, even though he has another father.

CHERYL HALL: Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise are planning to be the first couple on the City of Yarra’s new relationship register when it opens on 7 May. They hope the council register and the one being set up by the State Government will inadvertently help the non-biological parent to adopt Ethan by providing evidence a relationship exists. But that’s a move that will be opposed by the powerful Christian lobby. They support the relationship register, as long as it doesn’t mimic marriage and doesn’t open the door to adoption or parenting rights for same sex couples.

ROB WARD: The register doesn’t allow that. That would be a consequential change to other acts like the Adoption Act and so on. We feel the best interests of the child might not be served in that situation.

CHERYL HALL: Why not?

ROB WARD: The evidence seems to be pretty clear that the best interests of a child are served by having a mother and a father present, and that would be the ideal that we would be aiming for.

CHERYL HALL: If the State Government follows the interim recommendations of the Law Reform Commission, Jackie and Brett Robinson will be recognised as parents, with the surrogate’s consent. But Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise face bigger hurdles. Under the interim recommendations, they could have a child through altruistic surrogacy, but not commercial surrogacy. The Christian lobby is opposing both.

ROB WARD: I would say that there is a great deal of sympathy for infertile couples – I’m talking here married, heterosexual couples. Let me make that distinction really clear. There is a great deal of sympathy for people who are infertile. I’m not quite sure that we’re ready to rush down the road and to open the door, if you like, to surrogacy for all. Certainly not for homosexual couples.

CHERYL HALL: Can you say what you think would be best for the child in this situation?

ROB WARD: Firstly for it not to have happened. This couple, and perhaps others like them, are making a deliberate choice, a conscious decision, to bring about a child that doesn’t have proper parents in the normal sense. One wonders, down the track, what the future for that child might be, how confused that child might be about who its mother was, who its father is.

CHERYL HALL: Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise believe the community is ready to accept gay and lesbian families.

RODNEY CHIANG-CRUISE: We’ve had nothing but positive experiences. The community looks at a family and it doesn’t matter what shape it is, and if it’s happy and they see the kids are looked after and loved, that’s what matters.

[Link: ABC Transcript]

IT’S hard to tell who baby Ethan’s biological father is. And that’s the way his parents, Rodney and Jeff Chiang-Cruise, intended it to be.

The Melbourne couple recently returned from Ohio with their three-month old son, who was conceived in the US through a surrogacy arrangement.

They used two egg donors. Sperm from Rodney, who is Caucasian, was used to create an embryo with an Asian donor’s egg. Sperm from Jeff, who has an Asian background, was fertilised with a Caucasian donor’s egg. Both embryos were implanted into the surrogate, Kelly.

If both embryos were successful, the men would each be the biological parent of a twin.

If one was successful — as it turned out — the child would at least have physical traits from both their backgrounds.

A DNA test after Ethan’s birth confirmed who the biological father is. But that information, they say, is for Ethan to know.

Their son will never know, however, the identity of his biological mother.

Australian gay couples are increasingly seeking surrogacy arrangements in the US to fulfil their parental dreams.

To meet the $150,000 cost of conceiving Ethan, of which up to a quarter went to the surrogate, Rodney and Jeff remortgaged their house. Rodney says it is “just really shitty” that loving couples have to travel to become parents.

The Law Reform Commission says gay and lesbian couples and single women should have equal access to surrogacy as others.

Rodney says conservative opponents such as the Catholic Church should direct their energy into caring for neglected or abused children living in conventional families.

“They should stop worrying about people who are creating families out of love,” he says.

Rodney is comfortable with the commercial aspect of Ethan’s conception. The surrogate made some money, but she already had her own family.

“This was a gift that she wanted to share with somebody else.”

[Link: Original Article]

Melbourne City Council has dipped its toe into the legal minefield of gay civil unions. As Kenneth Nguyen discovered, it may prove a catalyst for change across the state.

Brendan Parker didn’t expect to find love at work. As he quips drily, “You don’t come across a gay accountant very often.”

He got lucky. Three years ago, while doing contract work, Parker met Timothy Dart. Today, the two accountants, 27 and 26 respectively, are still in love, sharing their relationship, their home in South Yarra and their place of employment.

Indeed, the two are so in love that, while in Canada recently, they considered getting married. Ultimately, they decided against taking the big step there: not because of their relationship, but because, as Parker says, the wedding process “is not just about the pen and paper. It’s really about sharing it with your family and friends – so unless they could all go to Montreal, it just doesn’t really work.”

But of course, the state and federal laws governing Victoria, where the couple’s family and friends live, offer no official recognition of gay unions.

The Melbourne City Council, however, is on the verge of striking out on its own, giving small recognition to same-sex couples. In November, deputy mayor Gary Singer and councillor Fraser Brindley successfully obtained in-principle support – albeit via a narrow 5-4 vote – for the council to set up a Relationships Declaration Register. A discussion model for the register was released last week. If it goes ahead, the register would be a Victorian first.

Brindley, who entered council in November 2004, was motivated to set up the register because of government inaction.

“It is entirely out of frustration with the state and federal governments that we are doing this,” he says. “I was hoping that in the ensuing two years we would get some action… It’s essentially an issue of equality: some members of the community are not being afforded the same rights and status as others, and that’s an injustice in my mind.”

The register is perhaps minor in terms of its practical import. Signing it will not give same-sex couples the legal rights enjoyed by married couples: city councils simply do not have that sort of power. But registration will give same-sex partners, and indeed heterosexual partners, independently documented evidence of their relationship: this could be used in legal proceedings where “domestic partners” have rights, such as for inheritances and, if the relationship fails, in the division of property.

More significant would be the symbolism of the register. Victorian Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby co-convener Gerard Brody says the register would “enable couples to have their relationships recognised in a formal way”.

Last Tuesday night, councillors heard why that was important. Its community service committee had tabled the register for discussion. Among those who made a submission were Rodney Cruise and his partner Jeff Chiang, who were there with their son Ethan.

“When Ethan grows up we want him to see that his family is real,” Cruise told the meeting. “How do you explain to your son that, ‘Yes, your grandpa and grandma are married, but your fathers are not’? “This relationship register is a start. It is a way of telling Ethan that, ‘Yes, we are a family ‘.”

That recognition would be of a scale unknown to gay people in Australia outside Sydney, which has a similar registration scheme, and Tasmania, which has a more comprehensive scheme that confers spousal rights on same-sex registrants. Given homosexuality’s tough history in this country, it is not hard to see why many gay people are seeking such recognition. As Parker says, “It just feels good to have something behind you.”

Naturally, though, the scheme has drawn opposition from those who regard homosexuality as immoral. Christian group Salt Shakers has led the most high-profi le campaign against the proposal, and also attended last week’s meeting.

“We oppose the normalisation of homosexuality,” Salt Shakers chief executive Peter Stokes explains, before drawing an analogy between prostitution laws and homosexuality laws.

“Before they legalised prostitution, there were 50 brothels throughout Victoria. But now we have something like 500… When you legalise something, you automatically give it a stamp of approval. Therefore, any recognition of same-sex relationships, whether it be by councils or governments, is going to give that relationship type a stamp of approval.”

Stokes also argues that few gay people are seeking recognition of their relationships, citing relatively low numbers of registrations in Sydney and Tasmania.

Many prominent gay figures, including High Court judge Michael Kirby and author Robert Dessaix, have said they have little interest in obtaining official recognition of their relationships. But Kirby says that the lack of interest is not a reason to prohibit gay marriage as an institution.

“The issue is not whether marriage is wanted by everyone,” Kirby said in a speech last year, “but whether… it should be available to all citizens who feel the need for that form of public affirmation of their relationship, or only to some who exhibit certain features of their sexual life that are deemed acceptable.”

Clearly, gay rights opponents and advocates disagree on much. What they would agree on, however, is that the Melbourne City Council’s registration scheme is just a first step for gay rights on the path to comprehensive recognition of same-sex relationships. First come the changes at a local government level; then at the state level, through the recognition of civil partnerships or unions; and finally, in the federal arena, through the recognition of civil unions or same-sex marriages. So goes the plan.

Already, it appears that the Melbourne City Council proposal is sparking change among other councils. The City of Yarra has backed a partnership registration scheme for its residents, while the Manningham, Stonnington and Port Phillip councils are also reported to be considering it.

Intriguingly, gay rights advocates are starting to see signs that the State Government – which has rejected their advances for more than seven years – might also be open to giving official recognition to same-sex relationships. Throughout most of last year, the State Government rebuffed attempts by Liberal-turned-independent MP Andrew Olexander to bring a private member’s bill that would have given recognition to gay civil unions.

But later in the year, the Victorian Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby started to enjoy a degree of dialogue with state MPs. Two members of the lobby met with the members for Richmond and Prahran, Richard Wynne and Tony Lupton, to discuss the possibility of a Tasmanian-style partnership registration program that could confer legal rights on same-sex couples.

Last week, Brody – the lobby’s co-convener – was scheduled to again meet with Lupton, as well as the parliamentary secretary for justice, Jenny Mikakos, and the parliamentary secretary for education, Fiona Richardson.

The official line from the Government now runs: “We have ongoing discussions with the gay and lesbian community about ways of further implementing equality and those discussions will continue.” Brody sounds encouraged by the tone of discussions so far. “I’m optimistic about what will happen this year and that they will move forward on this issue,” he says.

If the Bracks Government comes to the gay lobby’s party, the resulting legislation would seem to stand a good chance of passing the 40-seat Upper House. There, the ALP has 19 sea
ts and the traditionally gay-friendly Greens have three seats.

Meanwhile, Liberal leader Ted Baillieu has promised his MPs a conscience vote on the issue if it is raised in Parliament, and Democratic Labor Party MP Peter Kavanagh has expressed a willingness to discuss gay civil unions “providing there is a special status retained for marriage”.

But many questions remain. If moves are made, then what legal rights would be conferred, and would the recognition of same-sex couples require a ceremony or simply registration via an application form?

The last of these questions has been controversial. In Tasmania, same-sex couples achieve legal recognition by lodging an application form with a government authority. But when the ACT Government asked its gay and lesbian constituents what they wanted from a civil union or civil partnership scheme, many insisted upon a ceremonial aspect, occasionally in what might be regarded as impolitic terms.

“Registration is for dogs,” said one ACT activist on television. The territory ended up including a ceremonial aspect in its Civil Partnerships Bill. (Couples would have been required to make a declaration in front of a civil partnerships notary and a witness.) That, however, wound up being the death of the bill. On February 7, the Federal Government declared that it would disallow the bill if it was passed, citing an objection to the provision for a formal ceremony.

“What it’s doing is equating (same-sex partnership) with marriage,” federal Attorney- General Philip Ruddock said. “To put in place arrangements which give you what purports to be, to all intents and purposes, a marriage undermines that institution.”

Despite this, in the broader community there is growing support for civil union laws, especially among younger citizens. In an ACNielsen poll published in The Age last year, 45 per cent of respondents supported an ACT predecessor to the Civil Partnerships Bill that would have allowed gay civil unions, while 34 per cent opposed it.

It is a figure that would encourage Parker and Dart. In the meantime – in the absence of a more comprehensive gay civil unions law – the couple are ready to sign a relationship register.

THE COUNCIL PROPOSAL
Same-sex couples will be able to register their relationship with the City of Melbourne. Registration will not confer rights but may constitute evidence of a relationship in legal proceedings.
WHO RECOGNISES SAME-SEX RELATIONSHIPS?
TASMANIA Same-sex couples can register their relationship with the Tasmanian Office of Births, Deaths and Marriages. Registration gives couples immediate access to relationship rights, regardless of such factors as the duration of the relationship, financial interdependence or cohabitation. Only registered partners may adopt, or be presumed to be the parents of, children born to their partners from fertility treatments.
SYDNEY Same-sex couples can register their relationship with the City of Sydney. Registration does not confer rights but may constitute evidence of a relationship in legal proceedings.
OVERSEAS
- Same-sex marriage is allowed in jurisdictions including Canada, the Netherlands, Belgium, South Africa, Spain and Massachusetts (US).
- Same-sex civil unions or partnerships are recognised in jurisdictions including Britain, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, New Zealand, France, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Portugal, Vermont (US) and Connecticut (US).

[Link: Original Article]