Western Australia to Permit Legal Gender Changes Without Requirement for Surgery
Western Australians will also have the option to identify themselves as non-binary, indeterminate, and intersex.
A person in Western Australia (WA) can legally change their gender with just a letter from a medical practitioner as the state plans to introduce a new bill for gender recognition.
Currently, individuals must undergo surgical reassignment and provide evidence to the Gender Reassignment Board to register a gender change.
However, the Labor government intends to eliminate the Gender Reassignment Board and implement a streamlined administrative process for sex and gender recognition through the Registry of Births, Deaths, and Marriages.
The new requirement is a statement from a medical practitioner and psychologist confirming that the individual has received appropriate clinical treatment related to their sex or gender.
Young people under 18 will face stricter regulations, including parental consent or authorization from the Family Court of Western Australia under specific circumstances.
WA Premier Roger Cook praised the progressive bill as a significant step in the government’s commitment to developing WA’s first LGBTIQ+ inclusion strategy.
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“Everyone deserves to be recognized and respected for who they are, with their legal identity aligning with their lived identity.”
Attorney General John Quigley indicated that the legislation would bring WA in alignment with other states regarding gender recognition.
Currently, WA and New South Wales (NSW) are the only Australian regions requiring medical reassignment for individuals to change their sex on birth certificates.
“The State Government is fully committed to new equal opportunity laws and will continue to collaborate with stakeholders regarding this crucial reform,” Mr. Quigley stated.
The government is also working on a new Equal Opportunity Act and plans to “prohibit conversion practices through both criminalization and civil response measures.”
Labor also aims to introduce new legislation for assisted reproductive technology (ART) and surrogacy as soon as possible.
‘Anti-Women’ Reform
However, a similar bill introducing self-ID in NSW has faced resistance from a women’s rights organization, which criticized it as an “anti-women,” “anti-children reform.”
Think tank Women’s Forum Australia described the state’s ban on conversion practice as “the criminalization or restriction of care for people struggling with gender dysphoria.”
“These regressive reforms endanger, discriminate against, and/or commodify and exploit women and children, and in some cases, put at risk the rights and freedoms of NSW citizens, and subvert best medical practice,” the women’s forum said.
“They are out of step with evolving research and developments taking place overseas.”
The group also argued that removing bans on commercial surrogacy would “encourage the commodification of vulnerable women as wombs for rent and children as products for sale.”
A petition titled “Protect Women and Children in NSW” by Women’s Forum Australia has garnered over 21,000 signatures.
