Birth certificate

[Henniel91]

Hi everyone. Newbie here.
Me and my fiancé (both women) are expecting our first baby in January. Prior to conception I read that as long as we are married my girlfriend/fiancé will automatically be on the birth certificate.

However, reading some information telling me that we would have had to have been married at the time of conception! We did not know about this as thougjt we would be ok as long as we were married prior to baby arriving.

My fiancé is very upset, understandably, and we're a bit confused. Does anyone have any more information/correct information? We would prefer not going tge adoption route, but will if we have to. So frustrating. Any thoughts/experiences?

[angelsgirls]

Not sure if it's the same for same sex couples but if it is as long as your partner attends the appointment to register the child then they can be put on birth cert,

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Here is the official info: www.gov.uk/register-birth/who-can-register-a-birth

It says:

Same-sex female couples ... can include both their names on their child’s birth certificate when registering the birth. Either parent can register the birth on her own if all of the following are true:

• the mother has a child by donor insemination or fertility treatment
  
• she was married or in a civil partnership at the time of the treatment
  

If I understand this correctly, if you are married now, then you might not both be able to register the birth, but you can both be on the birth cert.

It may matter how the baby was conceived. DP and I conceived ours at a registered clinic, so although I am still not divorced from my ex-H and am not married to DP, I am automatically DD's legal mother. If you were also treated at a registered fertility clinic, then you would fall under this clause whether you're married or not.

The laws here are all quite new - we were the first same-sex female couple our registrar had ever dealt with at all (!) - so it might be worth asking somewhere more specific than MN.

[Henniel91]

Thank you for replying!

Went to a family/fertility show/seminar today and spoke to a few lawyers and soliciters.

Basically: we can both be on the certificate even though not married at time of conception depending on the local authorities. They advice against this as it might complicate things later on.

At time of registering birth of baby, we can on the same day, free of charge and without an appointment apply for parental/step-parental responsibility rights at the family court. Which will give my DH all the same rights as me, but without being the legal parent. We will then have to apply for second parent adoption through local authorities for her to legally and correctly be put on the baby's birth certificate :)

All is more settled now that we know exactly how to proceed, and without it being a difficult process (could have been worse hah!) :)

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Glad it is sorted. Fertility clinic was the only option for us in our circumstances, but in retrospect I feel glad because it does seem to have saved us a lot of paperwork! Good luck with your baby.