Taylor-Sands Michelle M
Melbourne Law School, The University of Melbourne; Victoria.
Med Law Rev. 2019 Aug 1;27(3):509-518. doi: 10.1093/medlaw/fwz010.
In September 2018, the Federal Court of Australia found that a Victorian woman did not need her estranged husband's consent to undergo in vitro fertilisation treatment (IVF) using donor sperm. The woman, who was 45 years of age, made an urgent application to the Court for permission to undergo IVF using donor sperm. In a single judge ruling, Griffiths J held that the requirement in the Assisted Reproductive Treatment Act 2008 (Vic) ('ART Act') for a married woman to obtain the consent of her husband discriminated against the woman in question on the basis of her marital status in contravention of the Commonwealth Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) ('SD Act'). His Honour declared the Victorian law in this instance 'invalid and inoperable' by operation of section 109 of the Commonwealth Constitution to the extent it was inconsistent with the Commonwealth law. Although the declarations by the Federal Court were limited in their terms to the circumstances of the case, the judgment raises broader issues about equity of access to assisted reproductive treatment (ART) in Victoria. The issue of partner consent as a barrier to access to ART was specifically raised by an independent review of the ART Act in Victoria. The Victorian Government released an interim report late last year as a first stage of the review, which canvasses some options for reform. This raises a broader question as to whether prescriptive legislation imposing detailed access requirements for ART is necessary or even helpful.
2018年9月，澳大利亚联邦法院裁定，一名维多利亚州女子在使用捐赠精子进行体外受精治疗（IVF）时无需征得分居丈夫的同意。该女子45岁，她紧急向法院申请许可使用捐赠精子进行IVF。在一项由独任法官做出的裁决中，格里菲斯法官认为，2008年《维多利亚州辅助生殖治疗法》（“《ART法》”）中要求已婚女性获得丈夫同意的规定，基于该女子的婚姻状况对其进行了歧视，这违反了1984年《联邦性别歧视法》（“《SD法》”）。法官宣布，就该条款与联邦法律不一致的程度而言，根据《联邦宪法》第109条的规定，维多利亚州的此项法律“无效且不可实施”。尽管联邦法院的声明在措辞上仅限于该案件的具体情况，但该判决引发了关于维多利亚州辅助生殖治疗（ART）获取公平性的更广泛问题。维多利亚州对《ART法》的一项独立审查特别提出了伴侣同意作为获取ART障碍的问题。维多利亚州政府去年年底发布了一份中期报告，作为审查的第一阶段，其中探讨了一些改革方案。这就引发了一个更广泛的问题，即对ART实施详细获取要求的规范性立法是否必要甚至有益。
