Parentage committee considers legislation allowing multiple parents for children conceived by sexual intercourse
April 8, 2022
BY Kevin Zakreski
BCLI’s Parentage Law Reform Project Committee continued its review of the rules in part 3 of the Family Law Act that apply to parentage of children conceived by sexual intercourse.
The committee completed its examination of a provision in the American Uniform Parentage Act 2017 (PDF) that sets out a court-based process to deny parentage to the perpetrator of a sexual assault that results in the birth of a child.
The committee also began its consideration of the issue of whether a child conceived by sexual intercourse may have more than two legal parents. Currently, part 3 of the Family Law Act doesn’t allow this. This rule for children conceived by sexual intercourse stands in contrast to part 3’s rule for children conceived by assisted reproduction, which doesn’t limit a child to two legal parents. In addition, BC’s supreme court has ruled in a recent case that its parens patriae jurisdiction permits it to declare that a child conceived by sexual intercourse may have more than two parents. Finally, it also differs from legislation in Ontario and Saskatchewan, both of which permit multiple parents regardless of the method of the child’s conception. The committee considered whether part 3 should be amended and, if it should be, what features that amendment should contain.
The goal of these discussions is to develop tentative recommendations to reform part 3 for a public consultation to be held later in the life of the project.
