(Quebec) An important part of the reform of family law, namely the supervision of surrogacy and the use of surrogate mothers, will ultimately not be adopted by the end of the session.
Posted at 10:03 p.m.
The Legault government complied on Wednesday with the request of the opposition parties who had been calling for several weeks on the Minister of Justice, Simon Jolin-Barrette, to split Bill 2 in order to first adopt the provisions concerning the gender identity. These articles respond to a judgment of the Superior Court which invalidated provisions deemed discriminatory towards trans and non-binary people in the Civil Code.
In the office of Minister Jolin-Barrette, it was said on Wednesday at The Press that it was preferable to stop the detailed study of the bill with the assurance that the articles studied would be adopted by June 10, rather than continuing the parliamentary work and risking adopting nothing of the reform . The opposition parties, for their part, judged that it was necessary to split the bill, while the detailed study of this voluminous piece of legislation (which comprises 360 articles) began late in the session since the minister was piloting until recently the study of Bill 96 on the French language.
In the end, Bill 2 as split – and which marks the first part of a reform of family law that has been demanded for decades – will mainly affect gender issues in the Civil Code, modify some thirty laws so that ‘they are representative of LGBT+ families, specifies that family violence includes domestic violence and that it must be considered in all decisions concerning the child, provides for eligibility for legal aid for children when the Direction de youth protection (DPJ) intervenes, and enshrines a right to know one’s origins, among other things.
“I am relieved that the Minister has changed his position and has agreed, as we asked him to do last week, to split the bill so that we do not lose all the valuable work done over the past few weeks, including for adopted people and non-binary and trans people, as well as for the important inclusion of the notions of family violence and domestic violence in the assessment of the best interests of the child. We are making significant progress for the citizens and families of Quebec. We should not have forced ourselves into an all or nothing approach, ”said PQ MP Véronique Hivon late Wednesday evening.
Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette also promised on Wednesday that the question of the supervision of surrogacy would return to the agenda during a next legislature if the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) still forms the government. Last week, the Barreau du Québec demanded in an interview with The Press major amendments to the bill since he considered that the articles concerning the use of female surrogates missed the mark in terms of public protection.