The Human Rights Review Tribunal has declared New Zealand’s adoption laws to be discriminatory and outdated and is calling for the 61 year old law to be changed. The Tribunal declared provisions of both the Adoption Act 1955 and Adult Adoption Information Act 1985 inconsistent with the right to be free from discrimination under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. Currently legislation doesn’t permit civil union partners and same-sex de facto couples are unable to adopt however in December, a groundbreaking adoption case saw an Auckland judge grant all same-sex couples eligibility to be granted int adoption orders. The Human Rights Commission has welcomed the landmark decision from the Human Rights Review Tribunal and urges the Government to make this legislative change. “The Adoption Act is more than 60 years old and no longer reflects New Zealand’s values and practices, urgent law reform is needed,” says Chief Human Rights Commissioner David Rutherford. “We urge Government to make the necessary legislative changes to remove the discriminatory provisions of these laws to ensure that our adoption legislation reflects societal norms and expectations: reform is long overdue.” The provisions declared inconsistent with the Bill of Rights include the inability of civil union partner or same-sex deficit couples to adopt and the requirement for sole male applicants to prove “special circumstances” before being permitted to adopt a female child. There is no such requirement for a single female to prove these “special circumstances”. It also found that there is an absence of a requirement for unmarried partners of a sole applicant for an adoption order to give consent. This is the case also when the couple is living together at the time of the application. The case against the Attorney General was brought to the tribunal by Adoption Action, an organisation with the objective of proposing and promoting changes to adoption law, polices and practice.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Wednesday, 9th March 2016 - 10:57am