The European Parliament approves the regulation on parenthood, which recognises the parents of children in all member states: the Italian case of surrogacy.
Parenthood established by a European Union country must be automatically recognised throughout the EU. To promote the protection and recognition of children's rights, the European Parliament took an important step last week, aimed at ensuring that all children enjoy equal dignity and opportunities in terms of education, healthcare, custody and inheritance, regardless of how they were conceived, where they were born or the type of family they belong to, whether "traditional", de facto or same-sex parent families.
With 366 votes in favour, 145 against and 23 abstentions, MEPs approved a proposal that, it should be said, does not aim to modify national family laws, since member states will retain their own sovereignty in determining matters relating to parenthood at national level. However, they will be required to recognise parenthood established in another EU country, unless there are strictly defined grounds based on individual assessments for not doing so, thereby avoiding discrimination, particularly against the children of same-sex parents. In Italy's case, one's mind turns to the ongoing political debate on surrogacy.
Furthermore, the bill provides for the introduction of a European certificate of parenthood, a document aimed at simplifying and reducing the bureaucracy associated with the recognition of parenthood within the European Union. Here too: the certificate will not replace national documents, but will be a complementary resource that can be used in their place, and will be available in all EU languages and in electronic format.
Portuguese MEP Maria-Manuel Leitão-Marques, of the Socialists and Democrats group and rapporteur of the bill, stressed that "no child should be discriminated against because of the family they belong to or the way they were born. Currently, children can legally lose their parents when they enter another member state. This is unacceptable. With this vote we are moving closer to the goal of ensuring that if you are a parent in one member state, you are a parent in all member states."
However marginal it may seem, the issue actually concerns as many as two million European children who could potentially be involved in situations where their parents are not recognised as such in a member state other than the one in which they live.
This is a matter that also closely concerns Italy, because it is closely tied to the question of surrogacy. The bill would indeed "compel" Italy to recognise children born through so-called surrogacy, which is banned in Italy, at the very moment when the government is seeking to make it a universal crime. "We are passing a law to ensure that surrogacy is prosecuted, even for Italian citizens, and even abroad," said Minister for the Family Eugenia Roccella. "So what could Italy's position possibly be?" Yet Italian MEPs were split at the time of the vote, and not only between centre-right and centre-left, but also within the majority itself: several Forza Italia MEPs, including Alessandra Mussolini, voted in favour.
Opposed, predictably, were the Italian Pro Vita associations and the Forum delle associazioni familiari: according to the president of the latter, Adriano Bordignon, "this is a clear attempt to transform parenthood into a right rather than a gift, by imposing the practice of surrogacy — a commercial activity in every respect, involving mediation agencies, clinics, doctors, psychologists and law firms — on everyone." The approval of the European bill, however, is still a long way off: the next steps include the consultation process between the European Parliament and member state governments, and the final decision must be taken unanimously: it will not be easy.
