A right to two parents?

Should IVF and donor insemination (DI) be available only to married women? This is a debate preoccupying the Australian High Court at the moment, as it seeks to find a resolution to a growing legal and political battle of wills.

Although a decision may be some time coming, the judges seem to be on the side of Lisa Meldrum, a young single woman trying to have a child by assisted conception. Against them is the might of the Catholic bishops who enjoy the backing of the Australian government, itself keen to keep IVF and DI for married women only. But according to many legal commentators, the bishops have a flimsy case.

Last year, Lisa Meldrum challenged the Infertility Treatment Act of Victoria in its ban on IVF and DI for single women. Only those with husbands or long-term partners are allowed treatment under the Act. She won the case on the basis of sex discrimination but is now back in court facing an appeal by the Catholic bishops.

Critics of Ms Meldrum's case say that the rights of children are being left out of the discussion and it's time it stopped. But whilst there's been plenty of argument about whether or not children born of assisted reproduction have rights before they are even conceived, few media commentators have asked how this applies to Lisa Meldrum's case. Even if children born of assisted reproduction do have some rights, do they - or any other children - have a right to two parents, or even two parents who are married to one another. It seems hard to justify.

IVF practitioners in the UK may not be worried that such an issue will come to court, largely because decisions about access to IVF are made at the clinic rather than in the statute books. But it may be time to think about what the justification there is for turning single women away from assisted reproduction treatment.