| Civil
war stories >> How Quebec politicians saw the light and same-sex couples won their right to civil unions
by AMY BARRATT
One day last month, between making appointments with the dentist and the vet, I placed a call to the Directeur de l’état civil requesting that they send me a form. Several days later, I received a Déclaration de filiation tardive in the mail. My partner and I filled out the single page, signed it and, without any more effort than that, made me a legal parent to the child I have been co-raising for four and a half years. Considering the social change it brings about, Quebec’s civil union law came into being quite quickly. But for those who watched its progress over six or seven months-from underdeveloped avant-projet to robust law-it was a roller-coaster ride of hope and despair. Although our government liked to say how tolerant and progressive it was, prior to this bill coming along it apparently had no idea that gays and lesbians have families. More than half Canada’s provinces passed laws giving at least some rights to same-sex parents before Quebec did. With Bill 84, we’ve not only caught up, we’ve moved to the head of the pack. (The recent Ontario ruling that same-sex couples should be allowed to marry might mean that province will catch up with or even overtake us someday, but the case is likely to remain before one court or another for at least a couple more years.) Globally, Quebec is now second only to Holland in terms of recognition of same sex families. Is there some irony in gay Quebecers gaining access to the equivalent of marriage when straight Quebecers are overwhelmingly choosing to shack up? Perhaps, but the reason behind this is simple: although gays and lesbians gained some recognition as common-law couples with Bill 32 in ’99, we still weren’t equal. Straight common-law partners are allowed to consent to care for an incapacitated partner. Until Bill 84, gay partners did not have that right. When a woman in a common-law relationship has a child, her male partner is automatically considered the father, unless she enters another name on the birth certificate. Until Bill 84, there was no possibility for two women or two men to legally parent a child together, no matter how long they had been living together as a couple. A further irony is that a law which started out being all about civil unions in the end changes the landscape for all of us, whether we “civilly unite” or not. Thus I can get my name added to our daughter’s birth certificate, even though we have not yet celebrated a civil union.
Paul Bégin, Quebec’s Justice Minister and Attorney General, first announced his intention-through a leak to Le Devoir-to introduce something called “union civile” in November 2001. The story appeared, not so coincidentally, on the second day of arguments in the well-publicized Hendricks-LeBoeuf case, in which a gay couple was suing the government for the right to marry. (They still are to this day; see page 40.) The leak came just days before the lawyer for the Attorney General’s office was to make his opening statement explaining why the Quebec government was opposing the petition. Their argument was simple: marriage falls under federal jurisdiction; Hendricks-Leboeuf were barking up the wrong tree trying to get marriage from Quebec. With the civil union idea they hoped to appease voters on both sides of the gay marriage question. They didn’t know what they were wading into.
Minister Bégin’s closest advisors in the community had been telling him gays and lesbians would be very happy with what he was proposing. The Justice Department did not expect the Coalition pour la reconnaissance des conjointes et conjoints de même sexe-an ad-hoc lobby of labour, feminist and gay and lesbian groups-to hold a press conference that same day denouncing the government’s proposal as not meeting the needs of gay and lesbian families. Within 24 hours of the leak, the Justice Department, instead of accepting accolades, was feverishly doing damage control. Feelers from Bégin’s office went out to the Coalition, asking for a meeting to discuss the community’s concerns. By Nov. 29, the Coalition identified several ways in which the government could and should expand its legislation. The Civil Union option should be available to heterosexual as well as homosexual couples; Quebec should remove Article 365-which defined marriage as between a man and a woman-from its civil code; and the law must include parental rights for same-sex couples. Bégin listened to these points, but made no promises. Particularly regarding parental rights (which, time and again over the next few months, would be referred to as “gay adoption”), the Minister made it clear that they would not make it into the bill unless public opinion was shown to be strongly supporting the move. (Approval rates vary widely on this question from poll to poll depending on the wording of the question, but a June 2001 Leger & Léger poll had found that 57 per cent of Quebecers felt that gays and lesbians should have the legal right to adopt children.) The first draft of the bill, titled Un loi instituant l’union civile des personnes de même sexe et modifiant le Code civil et d’autres dispositions législatives, was tabled on Dec. 7. In it, civil union was created as a special status for gays and lesbians. There was only one fleeting reference to “parental authority” which legal experts agreed was effectively meaningless. However, by the time the papers came out the next day, it was clear that, despite not being included in the bill in any form, “gay adoption” had become the hot topic for everyone involved, particularly the media. Le Devoir’s main headline on the story read: “Bégin est prêt à inclure l’adoption dans la loi.” A parliamentary commission was scheduled to hold hearings on the bill in February. Meanwhile, comment and letters pages all over Quebec began to heat up with the whole gamut of opinions.
The first two days of hearings, held in
the Red Room of the National Assembly, were incredibly encouraging.
Not one voice was raised against the concept of civil unions for gays
and lesbians. More significantly, nearly everyone who testified mentioned
the need for parental rights. In retrospect, the whole thing may have
been sewn up as of about 4 p.m. on Feb. 6, when “les trois jeunes”
reduced the justice minister to tears. It was invaluable for the members of the commission to meet these three smart, healthy (and, incidentally, heterosexual) products of gay and lesbian households. It was all very well to hear parents and even psychologists saying that children of same-sex parents turn out fine, but nothing could beat this flesh-and-blood evidence. The ensuing days of the commission featured some less sympathetic voices, but they could mostly be dismissed as fringe religious nuts. (After the law was adopted, Bégin identified another turning point. It concerned Benoît Laprise, the member for Roberval and president of the commission. Bégin wondered how he would ever get the 69-year-old grandfather and devout Catholic to accept the bill, particularly if it included parental rights. But, Bégin recalled, Laprise was won over by arguments about equal rights for all Quebec children, regardless of their parents’ sexual orientation. On day three of the hearings, Laprise engaged in a passionate exchange with some of the more conservative religious presenters, which ended with him huffing, “I don’t think you and I worship the same God.”) At the end of the final day of hearings, Feb. 21, Bégin made a statement incorporating all the major points that groups like the Coalition and the Lesbian Mothers Association had asked for. Among community activists, there was brief euphoria, but caution: we would have to wait for the second version of the bill to be tabled.
It was wonderful for Bégin to be so supportive of our cause, but we couldn’t be sure that the Parti Québécois as a whole was on side, and then there were the opposition parties to worry about. The Liberal Justice Critic, Michèle Lamquin-Ethier, was cautious in her closing statement. Though she expressed the party’s support for civil unions, she advocated a go-slow approach on parental rights, suggesting that more hearings be held specifically on this question, and even that they be dealt with by a separate bill. That’s when the letter-writing campaign moved into high gear: positive letters for Bégin and his leader Bernard Landry, praising their courage and urging them to see the project through; angry, disappointed letters for Lamquin-Ethier and her boss Jean Charest. A second version of the law, greatly changed from the first-it even had a new name-was tabled on April 25. Right in the lead, civil union was defined as a new civil status available to same-sex and opposite-sex couples. The odious Article 365 of the Civil Code, defining marriage as between a man and a woman, was to be removed. The title, Loi sur l’union civile et établissant de nouvelles règles de filiation, hinted that non-biological parents were about to be legally recognized. The Liberals got their extra day and a half of consultations, May 15 and 16. As it turned out, even with the politicians trying to stack the deck against us, there were more voices and better arguments raised for recognizing same-sex families than against them. Now the greatest fear was that the bill would get held up and would not pass before the National Assembly broke for the summer on June 23, in which case it could simply die. The third reading began on May 21.
On the morning of June 7, I was in Quebec City with my partner and our daughter to witness the final vote on Bill 84. One by one, 82 MNAs stood up to signal their support for the bill. When, in the end, it was pronounced adopted by unanimous vote, my daughter still didn’t really understand why I was hugging her and crying. Now her understanding is a little greater. I confess I haven’t tried to explain the difference between civil union and marriage. If you ask her about it, she’ll say that before, two women couldn’t get married to each other, and now they can. She is happy that we’re planning a fall ceremony, which we brazenly refer to as a wedding, because it means she gets to be a flower girl. And a ring bearer. : The Lesbian Mothers Association of Quebec has produced a bilingual pamphlet explaining the civil union law. Copies will be available at the LMA’s booth at Community Day (at Berri Square, corner Ste-Catherine and René-Lévesque), Saturday, Aug. 3, for a suggested donation of $3. The LMA can be contacted at 846-1543 |
