It's time for a conversation on parental surrogacy rules

As first reported in La Presse last week, a Quebec court recently handed down a decision in which a non-biological father was allowed to officially adopt twin girls born to a surrogate mother in India.

As a potentially precedent setting case, it’s worth watching where the legal and political conversations go from here. The issue of third party reproduction in Canada is a complicated one. Although it is not illegal to use a surrogate mother, the governing federal legislation, the Assisted Human Reproduction Act, states that it is illegal to pay a woman for her services. In Quebec, surrogacy is explicitly discouraged; Article 541 of the Civil Code stipulates “any agreement whereby a woman undertakes to procreate or carry a child for another person is absolutely null.” What this means in practical terms is that surrogate mother contracts in Quebec are not legally recognized. A woman who carries the child — whether for altruistic or commercial purposes — remains the legal mother. This status cannot be altered unless the child is officially adopted. 

The recent case in question involves a...