NZ surrogate mum ordered to help pay for child's upkeep
The Courier-Mail
26 January 2009
NZ surrogate mum ordered to help pay for child's upkeep
By Hannah Davies
The Federal Government is demanding a surrogate mother from New
Zealand pay child support for the baby she had for two gay Queensland
men.
The woman gave birth to the baby girl a year ago and is refusing to
pay for the child's upkeep, New Zealand's Sunday Star Times reported.
The baby is being raised by her biological father and his male
partner, who have gained child support benefits for the father to stay
home and care for her. The couple are the child's legal guardians.
The woman has refused to talk about the case but a friend said the
surrogate thought the baby's upkeep was the gay couple's
responsibility.
"She's told the couple they have to sort it out as there's no way
she's paying," the friend was quoted as saying.
"The deal was always that the men would sort out the legal and financial stuff."
Centrelink and the Child Support Agency confirmed they would be
seeking maintenance payments from the mother.
Family law expert Mark Henaghan, dean of law at New Zealand's Otago
University, said surrogates could not contract out of child support.
"Gay male couples are unable to adopt in most of Australia, which
meant the surrogate's name remained on birth certificates and
prevented her signing away legal rights to the child," he said.
"Guardianship was insufficient to remove the birth mother's legal duties.
"It's a blanket rule. The circumstances are irrelevant. If you are a
parent, unless someone adopts a child, you are the legal parent."
In a similar case, an Auckland woman is eight months' pregnant with a
son to another gay Australian couple.