Boy can have three parents, court rules

A FIVE-YEAR-OLD Canadian boy can have two mothers and a father, an Ontario court ruled this week in a landmark case that redefines the meaning of family and examines the rights of parents in same-sex relationships.

The Ontario Court of Appeal said the female partner of the child’s biological mother could be legally recognised as the boy’s third parent.

The biological father, named on the boy’s birth certificate, is a friend of both women and is taking an active role in the child’s life.

“It is contrary to (the child’s) best interests that he is deprived of the legal recognition of the parentage of one of his mothers,” Justice Marc Rosenberg wrote in the ruling, which did not name the three parents or the child.

“Perhaps one of the greatest fears faced by lesbian mothers is the death of the birth mother... Without a declaration of parentage or some other order, the surviving partner would be unable to make decisions for their minor child.”

The two women, who have been together since 1990, told the court they did not want to adopt because the father would lose his status as a parent.

The Alliance for Marriage and Family, a coalition of several groups that promote a traditional family structure, had filed as an intervenor in the case.