Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018
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LEGAL AFFAIRS AND COMMUNITY SAFETY COMMITTEE Members present: Mr PS Russo MP (Chair) Mr CR Boyce MP Mr JP Lister MP Mrs MF McMahon MP Ms CP McMillan MP Staff present: Ms R Easten (Committee Secretary) Ms M Westcott (Assistant Committee Secretary) PUBLIC HEARING—INQUIRY INTO THE BIRTHS, DEATHS AND MARRIAGES REGISTRATION AMENDMENT BILL 2018 TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS FRIDAY, 23 MARCH 2018 Brisbane Public Hearing—Inquiry into the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018 FRIDAY, 23 MARCH 2018 ____________ The committee met at 11.15 am CHAIR: Good morning. I declare open this public hearing for the committee’s inquiry into the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018. I am Peter Russo, member for Toohey and chair of the committee. With me here today are James Lister, member for Southern Downs and deputy chair; Melissa McMahon, member for Macalister; and Corrine McMillan, member for Mansfield. Steve Andrew, member for Mirani and Jim McDonald, member for Lockyer, are apologies. Standing in for the member for Lockyer is the member for Callide, Colin Boyce. I would like to welcome Colin. On 7 March 2018 the Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, the honourable Yvette D’Ath, introduced the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018 to the parliament. Parliament referred the bill to the Legal Affairs and Community Safety Committee for examination with a reporting date of 23 April. The bill’s objective is to amend the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 2003 to remove the restrictions in section 22 on noting the reassignment of a married person’s sex on the Register of Births or Adopted Children Register. The purpose of the hearing today is to gather further evidence to assist the committee in its inquiry into the bill. Only the committee and invited witnesses may participate in the proceedings. Witnesses are not required to give evidence under oath but I remind witnesses that intentionally misleading the committee is a serious offence. These proceedings are similar to parliament and are subject to the Legislative Assembly’s standing rules and orders. In this regard I remind members of the public that under the standing orders the public may be admitted to or excluded from the hearing on the discretion of the committee. The proceedings are being recorded by Hansard and broadcast live on the parliament’s website. Media may be present and will be subject to my direction at all times. The media rules endorsed by the committee are available from the committee staff if required. All those present today should note that it is possible you may be filmed or photographed during the proceedings. I ask those present to turn mobile phones off or to silent mode. BLACK, Mr Peter, Queensland Aids Council and the Equality Campaign CARNIE, Ms Lee, Lawyer, Human Rights Law Centre (via teleconference) CLARK, Mr Thomas, Law Reform Director, LGBTI Legal Service Inc DICKSON, Ms Roz, Private Capacity CHAIR: I invite you to make an opening statement after which the committee may have some questions for you. Mr Black: As you know, last year the Australian government conducted the Australian marriage law postal survey which saw the yes vote overwhelmingly prevail. Almost 1.5 million Queenslanders voted yes to marriage equality, a total of 61 per cent of all Queenslanders who participated in the postal survey. On 7 December last year a bill to reform Australian marriage law was passed in the Commonwealth parliament and marriage equality is now a reality for most Australians. However, the historic introduction of marriage equality last year was bittersweet for many members of the LGBTIQ community, especially those within the transgender community. Not only were they unfairly targeted by the no campaign, the passage of legislation through the federal parliament still did not provide marriage equality for many within the transgender community as they were forced to choose between changing their sex on official documents and their marriage. The bill before the committee today, the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018 addresses this injustice. Thomas Clarke from the LGBTI Legal Centre will talk a little bit more about the support for this reform, as will Lee Carnie from the Human Rights Law Centre, Roz Dickson will provide her personal experience as to how this injustice has affected her. CHAIR: Lee, I invite you to chime in at any point when you feel the need. Brisbane - 1 - 23 Mar 2018 Public Hearing—Inquiry into the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018 Mr Clark: Thank you, committee, for inviting us to appear today. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Queensland government for its commitment to equality for all Queenslanders with the introduction of this bill. When the bill to reform the Australian marriage law passed the Commonwealth parliament, marriage equality was finally extended to most Australians. As Peter said, it was a bittersweet victory for many members of our community, particularly the transgender and gender diverse community. The bill will bring the consequential legislative issues we are here to address today into line with the win for marriage equality, particularly section 22 of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Act, which is the procedure by which a person may change their sex marker on their birth certificate. This issue exists because section 22 requires that a person be unmarried in order to change their sex marker forcing transgender people to choose between affirming their gender identity through legal recognition and their marriage, a near impossible choice. In any event, unless a transgender person could demonstrate their marriage had broken down, they would be unable to demonstrate the requirements for a divorce meaning a change of birth certificate was unlikely. The rationale and policy considerations for section 22 no longer exist post marriage equality. The exemption for state and territory governments to include the requirement to be unmarried contained in the Sex Discrimination Act of the Commonwealth will accordingly be removed within 12 months. In addition, the United Nations concurs with the moves by the Queensland parliament to address these issues. Prior to marriage equality, in the case of G v Australia it found that by refusing to allow a married person to have a birth certificate consistent with their sex unless they get a divorce was breaching the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In particular, it considered article 17, the right to privacy and family, and article 26, the right to not be discriminated against on the basis of marital status and gender identity, to have been breached. We see these issues first hand through the experiences of our clients at the legal service. One such client is a veteran of the armed forces and after going through an extremely difficult process of accepting their gender identity over many years of active service and coming out to their family was told in order to receive legal recognition they had to divorce their partner. The service thanks the Queensland government for its commitment to the LGBTI community and wider consultation on other issues with the Births, Deaths and Marriages Act through the consultation paper entitled Registering life events: Recognising sex and gender diversity and same-sex families, and we look forward to the opportunity to address other issues contained within this act. Today, with section 22 Queenslanders believe in a fair go for LGBTI people. With the overwhelming demonstration for equality during the marriage law postal survey, we ask that the committee make the recommendation to remove the unmarried requirement from the Births, Deaths and Marriages Act. Thank you. Ms Dickson: Thank you for this opportunity to speak. I am here representing myself. I am a member of the LGBTI community and a member of a couple of community organisations, but I am one of those people personally affected by this law. I began to transition genders in 2011 and with the support of my wife, who supported me through that time, we offered each other a divorce if we should choose to have it and that was a difficult thing to do for me, but it was the right thing. When you think about it, no fault divorce is anybody’s entitlement or opportunity in our law in our country anyway. Neither of us was forcing the other to stay together. Back then we had two young children—sorry for the emotion. As you can see as I run through the memories of those times, it was quite a difficult time. Life is much better now. We are still married raising our two children and our family is stronger than ever. I personally was invited to speak at the marriage equality rallies in Brisbane and shared my story of transition. Cathy and I have done a radio interview about my transition with 97.3 FM Radio with their morning show and been quite open about the experience. One of the difficult times for me was back in the end of 2012 when I had to or wanted to, because I was now living full-time as the woman you see before you, change my identification to match. Prejudices exist in society and fears exist. We hear the old stories and we would have all, or I had, seen the old videos of Carlotta getting arrested for wearing female clothes in that era. You grow up with memories from your childhood of fears of being bullied and so you bury who you are. This bill offers an opportunity to legally complete what I have started. I have spoken before thousands at the marriage equality rallies in Brisbane, shared my story, stood before them and asked them basically, ‘Do you see a man or a woman?’ Brisbane - 2 - 23 Mar 2018 Public Hearing—Inquiry into the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Amendment Bill 2018 In 2012 I had a female driver’s licence because my doctor certified that I should be permanently considered female.