VANCOUVER, B.C. August 30, 2001 (LSN.ca) – A British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal ruling has granted both parties in a lesbian relationship the legal right to register as parents on a childâs birth certificate. The Tribunal decided that when a woman has a child using sperm from an anonymous donor, her lesbian partner may also register as a parent.
Previous to the ruling, the non-birth partner had to adopt the child before she could become the child’s legal parent, whereas heterosexual couples who had a child together using an anonymous sperm donor could both be registered as parents on the child’s birth certificate.
The human-rights tribunal has ordered B.C.‘s Vital Statistics Agency to “amend the birth registration forms so that it provides the option of identifying, as a parent, a non-biological parent who is the co-parent of a mother or father.” The ruling applies to all same-sex couples.