Lee Melissa: Sullivan Birth Certificate Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLee Melissa: Sullivan Birth Certificate Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 19 February 2014. Volume:696;Page:16119. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MELISSA LEE (National):Ahnnyung ha seyo. On that note I would like to start by wishing everyone a happy New Year considering the lunar New Year just actually happened and we have all been around many different parts of the country celebrating the lunar New Year the Year of the Horse. Let me greet you in my mother tongue: sehaebokmanibaduseyo. It translates to “May your new year bring you lots and lots of luck.” I just thought I would start and actually have a look at the Year of the Horse. The wood horse according to the Chinese horoscope is a time of fast victories unexpected adventure and surprising romance. So if there are any single people in this House I wish you good romance this year. According to the Korean astrological chart this is the year of the blue horse. May it be significant in this election year.Let me start by acknowledging all of the speakers who have spoken on this bill the Sullivan Birth Certificate Bill. It is of course my pleasure to rise in support of the bill. I remember speaking at the first reading and actually mentioning my little cultural experience where in certain countries where people are born in a particular town or at a particular time and because they are worried that the children might not actually survive a certain period of time they do not register the children. They actually register them later and often the children end up with the wrong birth date. This is quite different.I have not actually been to the Government Administration Committee. I was not part of the select committee but I commend the members who have worked on this bill. Hearing them speak so passionately about this bill I commend the work that you have done because I think it is incredible to hear everyone talking about and acknowledgingRowen Sullivan and her parents. Her parents have obviously done a fantastic job in raising an amazing young woman who wants to honour her mother. As a parent of a teenage child I would only hope that one day when he grows up that he might want to honour me. I hope he is actually listening to the debate today.I was looking at the issue of identity—how a person conceives their identity and how they express their identity. Often their identity comes from their parents. Parents are the very first people who imprint the personality on their children. Children identify with their parents and their own identity is formed as a result of the education that they receive from their parents as the first educators. I also want to talk about things like national identity because it is where you come from. It is the cultural identity. It is like how I am Korean. Yesterday we had the Speaker from the Korean Parliament visit New Zealand’s Parliament. I was so very proud to have met him here and actually have lunch with him as the chair of the Korean - New Zealand Parliamentary Friendship Group because that is my cultural identity. That is where my first impressions of my own personality and identity were formed. From being born in Korea through my parents I am who I am today because of all of the influences that I have had. I thinkRowen has had fantastic parents both Diane Sullivan and Doreen Shields and she wants to honour her mother.As previous speakers have said this bill requires the Registrar-General of Births Deaths and Marriages to record details ofRowen Sullivan’s deceased mother onRowen’s post-adoptive birth registration entry. I was thinking about how it would feel to not have my parent’s name on my own birth certificate. I mean I would not even know how to feel about that because we all take it for granted. I know Mr Hague talked about having children in his relationship and how in the past for couples who are of the same sex who adopt it was only the one person who could adopt rather than bothparents who could actually adopt. So when you look at it that way and translating it into my own circumstances and my own life you sort of think “How would I feel if I did not have both my parents’ names on the birth certificate?”. That would really upset me very much because I am who I am as a result of both my parents—my father and my mother.ForRowen it is both Diane and Doreen who have made her who she is.Rowen’s parents from birth were Diane Sullivan her birth mother and Diane Sullivan’s partner Doreen Shields. Diane Sullivan’s name was on her birth certificate but Diane died in 2010 whenRowen was just 17. That is only 2 years older than my son who is now 15. Knowing my son and how young he is at 15 how devastating would it have been forRowen to have lost her mother and to find out subsequently that when Doreen applied for an adoption order following the death of Diane Sullivan the order required Diane’s name to then be removed fromRowen’s birth certificate and for them to consider that? And how would they have actually felt? No one in this House could possibly understand what that might have felt like. OnlyRowen knows and only her adoptive mother knows what that was like. That would have been a terrible devastating heart-wrenching experience because you would want to remember your mother.Had Diane and Doreen been able to marry as previous speakers have said they would of course have been able to jointly apply for their names to appear on the birth certificate. For someone who has actually gone through the process with some friends who have had help with human reproductive assistance where a couple who could not actually have children for more than 15 years went and had some assistance—in my culture even adoption is actually frowned upon. I remember my friend going through the whole pregnancy of her surrogate—this actually happened outside of New Zealand. But her surrogate the mother was going through the pregnancy and then the adoptive mother pretended that she was pregnant right throughout the whole pregnancy. I remember her having to actually stuff her tummy with things to make her look like she was pregnant because she did not want the stigma attached to her daughter when she finally came home as her daughter. So that heart-wrenching experience that she went through was something that made me sort of understand the kind of agony thatRowen and Doreen would have gone through.Following the Marriage (Definition of Marriage) Amendment Act of 2013 same-sex couples are now able to marry and can apply to jointly adopt children. So what this bill is actually doing is making a matter of fact—the fact that Diane Sullivan and Doreen Shields are in fact bothRowen’s parents—just a matter of law just a record and it will make it permanent so that from now on whenRowen applies for a future birth certificate both her parents will be on that piece of paper. For me that piece of paper is very significant because that is one wayRowen identifies herself. It is a certificate basically confirming what she has known all her life which is that it was in fact both her parents—not just one not the other but both of them—who were her parents who brought her up so well to be proud of who she is and it is honouring her mother who has very sadly passed away. I wish you the best of luck and I would like to congratulate my colleague and friend Louisa Wall on bringing this bill to the House and managing the select committee process so that all your colleagues would support you in this bill. It is a great bill. I commend it to the House.