WA Assisted Reproductive Technology and Surrogacy Legislative Review Planning for New Legislation - Western Australia Donor Conception Survey

Overview

In May 2022 a Ministerial Expert Panel (MEP) was appointed by the Minister for Health to address key elements identified for further consideration, in intended new legislation for assisted reproductive technology and surrogacy (ART) legislation.  
 
The MEP would like feedback from people conceived through donation; donors (of sperm, eggs or embryos); donor recipients; and other interested people. It is important to note that most recommendations from Associate Professor Sonia Allan's Review of the Human Reproductive Technology Act 1991 and the Surrogacy Act 2008 (the Review) were accepted by the government. The Government’s response to the Allan Review is available.  
 
The Review recommended areas where WA’s legislation should be updated. This included the recommendation that donor-conceived people have a right to access identifying information about their donor, regardless of when they were born. Currently only people who are donor-conceived from donations made on or after 1 December 2004 have a legal right to identifying information about their donor from age 16 years.
  
If the above recommendation becomes law it would retrospectively remove anonymity for donors who donated sperm, eggs or embryos before 1 December 2004. It is proposed that donors would have a right to a contact preference, which would allow them to define if, when and how they want to be contacted by the donor-conceived person. This may include no contact or contact under specific terms. Information would be stored within a contact register, which would be managed by the WA Department of Health. 
 
One difficulty for donor-conceived people who were born before 1993 and who are seeking information currently is that there was no legislation requiring collection of their information. Records may be held by fertility clinics prior to this time.  
  
Any responses to this survey will remain confidential. You may wish to familiarise yourself with the above-mentioned documents before completing. 
  
The survey will take between 5 to 15 minutes to complete.