ࡱ> 021` -bjbjss . -Bd. . . . : R R R R R - - - UWWWWWW$h*>{s - - s s {R R    s .R R U s U   R F . U0 h Lh  h!4- 0] "   - - - {{ - - - s s s s jj$&> Dr. Kate Stewart [Details removed] Dear HREOC, Thank you for the opportunity to make a public submission to the National Inquiry into Discrimination against People in Same Sex Relationships: Financial and Work-Related Entitlements and Benefits. I am a pathologist, aged 34, and a lesbian. My partner (a secondary school teacher) and I have been together for over 6 years. My partner and I are planning to try to have a baby early next year, using donor sperm from our very good friend [name removed]. Our child will have two parents, both mothers, and a loving father who will be actively involved in our childs life, although he does not wish to take the responsibility of a parent. From the very start, our baby will have advantages not just one but three adults in his/her life who love and care for him, both male and female, and the security of knowing exactly who both his biological and adoptive parents are. Although the official attitude towards same-sex headed families is that the children are deprived of something, our experience and much research shows that it simply is not true. Our child will be luckier than so many other children who will be born at the same time. So why must we be officially counted as a single parent family? For me, this is not about our rights as parents, but our childs rights to have her family validated and accepted by her own country. Its about her right to full legal protection in the case of the death of either of her parents. It is her right to be included on a Medicare card which lists every member of her family. It is blatantly wrong to deny children this protection because there are still so many in the community who neither approve of nor understand the sexuality of their parents. Our sexuality is not, or should not be the issue, it is all about our children who are Australian citizens, born of Australian citizens, and deserve every protection that is available to Australian children born to any other family. My partner and I feel so strongly about the absence of official acknowledgement of the parenthood of the non-biological mother that we are planning to travel to Canberra from Victoria to have our baby, if its possible, so that our child will have both his parents names on the birth certificate. Ideally wed like to have all three of us on there, but we have no desire for [name removed] to be officially acknowledged as the father if my partner cannot be acknowledged as the mother as well. Having a birth certificate which truly reflects our situation changes nothing in term of legal recognition of our family, we know, but for our childs sake we think it is of the utmost importance. I probably dont need to explain how inconvenient, expensive and probably distressing it will be, to have to move interstate when I am 36 weeks pregnant, find a place to stay in, hang around waiting to deliver in a strange city without my family and friends around me, and travel back home a week later with a newborn at a time when we will all need as much support as we can get. Imagine if straight couples using anonymous donor gametes were forced to do the same thing, to be both officially counted as parents! We are Australian citizens and we pay taxes, and as I am a PAYE high income earner, those taxes are substantial. We contribute to our communities every day in our work as a doctor and a teacher, both in the public sector, and we both volunteer hours each week in one of our local sporting clubs. The fact that we are in a couple together, both women, harms no person and more importantly, will not harm our child. In fact we believe that our relationship is a positive force as we are happy and content in our personal lives which allows us to devote our energies more productively at work and in a voluntary capacity. To pretend that we either dont have children, or that we wont have them if we continue to be ignored and derided as parents, is a fantasy and a very destructive one. It is that which causes harm. For us this isnt about financial disadvantage, although that certainly exists, but official and legal recognition of our family in all spheres. To want to and to be allowed to have children is probably the most basic human right of all, so I cannot understand why it is a right still thought by many to be exclusive to the heterosexual population only. Kate Stewart 30/5/2006 "#$ =L-ha7 h'5\hX6h0ShX6CJaJ hX6h' hX6hX6h' #$z { }~!+,-gd'-,1h. 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