A woman who lives as if she is a man cannot be recorded as the father on her child’s birth certificate, the Court of Appeal ruled in late April.
The judges upheld the High Court’s ruling, saying the law requires those who give birth to be listed as mothers.
After transitioning, the woman, known now as Freddy McConnell, retained her female reproductive organs, conceived via donated sperm and IVF, and gave birth in 2018. McConnell challenged the government when she was not permitted to list her relationship to the child as ‘father’ on the birth certificate.
During the case, the government argued that McConnell’s child has the ‘right to know the identity of the person who carried him or her’. The judges said the original ruling did not violate McConnell’s human rights. Lord Burnett denied McConnell permission to appeal to the Supreme Court, but McConnell said she still intends to do so.
In September, Sir Andrew McFarlane ruled that anyone who gives birth to a child is a mother. Whatever gender they presume, their parental status he ruled ‘is that of mother’.
