Complications with issuing Australian passports in overseas surrogacy journeys
Tuesday, November 06, 2018
When children obtain Australian citizenship after being born through surrogacy overseas, the next step (whether overseas or in Australia) is to obtain an Australian passport.
The Australian Passports Act 2005 requires anyone who has parental responsibility for a child to consent to a passport issuing for a child. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has long taken the view that the surrogate, as the birth mother of the child, has parental responsibility. As a result, the Department requires parents who have undertaken surrogacy overseas to have a Form B-5 to be filled out by the surrogate.
While this might seem pretty straightforward, this just doesn’t happen once. With the exception of a child changing its name or its passport being lost, a child will typically have four passports issued, because they only last 5 years:
· At birth
· 5 years
· 10 years
· 15 years
In other words, the parents have to go through this procedure for another three occasions. To avoid this process, there are two ways to get around getting the consent of the surrogate:
1. Obtaining an order of the right kind from an Australian court.
2. Having the passports officer dispense with the surrogate’s consent.
There are several grounds for dispensation, but typically obtaining an order in the US or Canada has been enough to dispense with the requirements.
The particular regulations give a series of grounds on which there can be dispensation, the significant one being:
“An order of a court in a Convention country (within the meaning of the Family Law (Child Abduction Convention) Regulations 1986) permits any of the following:
(i) The issue of a passport to the child;
(ii) The child to travel internationally;
(iii) Contact between the child and another person outside the country where the order was made.”
The type of country that is described is a country that has signed the 1980 Hague Child Abduction Convention. Both the US and Canada, for example, have done so.
One might think that if the surrogate and her husband are no longer the parents under US or Canadian law and therefore do not have rights of custody under the 1980 Hague Child Abduction Convention, that they will not be recognised as parents in Australia.
Without getting into too much detail, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade remains insistent that in its eyes the birth mother retains parental responsibility, unless there is an order of an Australian court removing that. An Australian court can do that in one of five ways:
– By recognising that the intended parents are the parents under Australian law (and that therefore the surrogate and her husband do not have parental responsibility)
– By registering the US surrogacy order with the Family Court of Australia, the Family Court of Western Australia or a Supreme Court of a State or Territory
– By making an order for parental responsibility under the Family Law Act
– By making an adoption order
– By making an order dealing with parental responsibility under child protection legislation
These options may be impractical, inapplicable or costly.
Hang on- what about the US/Canadian order?
One might also think that it is a given – that if a court in the US or Canada declares that the intended parents are the only parents of the child – that therefore the parents (as declared by that court order) can decide whether a passport is issued or for the child to travel internationally, such terms being implied in the order.
Apparently, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has accepted that argument in many cases; and has many times dispensed with the need for the surrogate’s consent, without the need for the parents to obtain an order from an Australian court.
The Department’s requirements of an exception
However, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade indicated a couple of weeks ago to clients of mine that the Department would notdispense with the consent of the surrogate based on the making of an order in a Convention country, unless the order specifically stated one of the three grounds.
As a result of this change, intended parents who are undertaking surrogacy in the US and Canada in particular should be seeking that the orders specifically contain one of the three grounds, for example that the child is to travel internationally. Whether the court in the US or Canada is able to make such an order without much fuss or cost is another matter entirely.
What if there is not the right type of order?
For those parents who have obtained a US or Canadian court order without those magic words- expect that you will still need to have the written consent of the surrogate to the issue of the Australian passport.
There are some other grounds for dispensation of the surrogate’s consent. One of those is that “there has been no contact between the child and the non‑consenting person for a substantial period before the application is made”. In my clients’ case, the child was two, and had had no contact with the surrogate since it had been born. The dispensation was able to be granted.
The full list of grounds are:
“(a) if the application is made by or on behalf of the child—neither the applicant nor the Minister has been able to contact the non‑consenting person for a reasonable period;
(b) the non‑consenting person is either or both of the following:
(i) missing;
(ii) presumed dead;
(c) the non‑consenting person is medically incapable of providing consent;
(d) there has been no contact between the child and the non‑consenting person for a substantial period before the application is made;
(e) the non‑consenting person:
(i) is not an Australian citizen; and
(ii) is separated from a person who has parental responsibility for the child and has consented to the child having an Australian passport; and
(iii) has not had contact with the child since the child arrived in Australia;
(f) a family violence order has been issued against the non‑consenting person;
(g) if the child is outside Australia—there is evidence of family violence;
(h) if the child is outside Australia—the Minister considers that there is a need for the child to travel internationally or the child requires a passport to continue to legally reside overseas;
(i) an order of a court in a convention country (within the meaning of the Family Law (Child Abduction Convention) Regulations 1986) permits any of the following:
(i) the issue of a passport to the child;
(ii) the child to travel internationally;
(iii) contact between the child and another person outside the country where the order was made;
(j) an order of a State or Territory court, made under a child welfare law, grants parental responsibility or guardianship of the child to:
(i) a parent of the child other than the non‑consenting person; or
(ii) a person other than a parent of the child.”
If in doubt, get advice first!
