Singapore allows gay couple to adopt their surrogate son in landmark ruling
- The two men are Singaporeans of Chinese ethnicity, aged 45. They began dating in 1998 and have lived together since 2005
- The process was treated as single-parent adoption and will confer to one of the men sole parental rights and responsibility for the child
Singapore’s High Court has made a landmark ruling allowing a gay couple to adopt their five-year-old son conceived through a surrogate in the United States, on the basis of prioritising the child’s welfare.
In a 145-judgment released on Monday, a panel of three judges led by Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon ruled the adoption bid, rejected by a lower court last year, should go through because it would “increase the child’s prospects of acquiring Singapore citizenship and securing long-term residence in Singapore”.
Singapore has a law banning gay sex and the government has said any change to legislation will need to take into account public opinion, which is deeply divided over the issue.
The judgment noted the court considered Singapore’s public policy on same-sex families and its relation to this case as well as any policy violation if an adoption order was made. Yet neither reason was “sufficiently powerful to enable us to ignore the statutory imperative to promote the welfare of the child and, indeed, to regard his welfare as first and paramount”, the judgment said.
The judges also stressed their decision was not an endorsement of the couple’s actions or a result of “sympathies for the position of either party”.
