STATUTES AMENDMENT (SURROGACY) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 5 February 2009. Page 1410.)

Mr VENNING (Schubert) (11:21): I will conclude my remarks, and I congratulate the member in the other place, the Hon. John Dawkins, for bringing this bill to the house. It is an emotive issue, and I think that, to most of us, this is a conscience matter; so there isn't a party position on this.

At this point I just want to say this morning how disgusted I am that we are here going through this Notice Paper—and we have a new member here—and adjourn, adjourn, adjourn. I say, as Whip from this side of the house and to the Whip on the other side of the house, and to you, sir, asSpeaker, and to those on the Standing Orders Committee, that we should not allow a waste of taxpayers' money like this, because these motions have no intention of going any further. I believe they should be dealt with and taken off the Notice Paper.

Mr Bignell interjecting:

Mr VENNING: I said 'both sides': I didn't exclude you.

The SPEAKER: The member for Schubert will address the bill. If he has other remarks to make, he can do so at another time.

Mr VENNING: Thank you, sir. I just do not know when I can, because I did include us—

The SPEAKER: Well, you are speaking now, so I suggest you speak to the bill.

Mr VENNING: The house—I was talking about the house, not so much the government. We need to address it. I believe these matters have been on the Notice Paper and they are never finished with. They just sit here, and we adjourn them.

I commend this motion to the house in relation to surrogacy. It is an emotive issue and a conscience issue. I believe that having children is one of the greatest honours and privileges we can have. Just this morning, when looking at my grandson, I thought how wonderful it is for couples to have children. It makes relationships; it makes marriages. It gives a purpose in life.

If a couple cannot have children—and today many people cannot have children—this is a way that they can achieve their dream. I cannot see at all why we have taken so long to agree to this when, as I understand it, this is law in other states. I cannot understand why it has taken so long here in South Australia for us to pick it up.

I believe that surrogacy is an option, particularly when everybody is aware of the situation and legally tied up by legislation. We have so much cost involved today in relation to IVF programs and so on. I believe this is common sense. Again, I commend the member in the other place because he has been a long-term campaigner on this issue. I have not heard any member in this house speak against it. One or two in the other house have had some concern with it, but generally it has support. I commend this bill to the house and I urge members to pass it forthwith. We could do something for the morning.

Mr HANNA (Mitchell) (11:25): I speak briefly to this measure, which sets out situations in which surrogacy may be permitted at law. It is not something where a common law contract would be permitted, so parliaments around Australia are grappling with modern technologies regarding reproduction and options for having children such as surrogacy.

I want to make one point, and I think it is a point that was lost in the IVF debate we had in the parliament recently, and I fear it is being lost in this debate on this legislation: I think that the prospects, if not the rights, of the child to be brought into being should have primacy in the debate. The prospects of the child should be the foremost consideration. That is something which the government chose to water down in our IVF legislation, and I was sorry to see that.

I think we need to be very careful in advancing through these waters, and we need to be very careful that we are considering just what sort of a family home we are bringing children into.

Debate adjourned on motion of Mrs Geraghty.