Police Checks a Necessity for More than Just Employment?

When considering the uses of Police Checks, most people would assume that they would be used solely in order for people to gain employment, to be assessed when looking to volunteer, or for similar reasons. However, the state of Victoria now requires those couples who are attempting to conceive via IVF to also submit to a police check.

History of the Victorian Law

In 2010, the state of Victoria passed laws which require those who wish to undergo IVF treatment in order to conceive a child to obtain a police check. They are also required to obtain a Child Protection Order Check. Those individuals who have spent a year or more residing in another country in the ten years previous to them obtaining Assisted Reproductive Treatment (ART) must provide a police check from that country as well.

Why require these checks for those receiving ART?

There is an argument to be made that in requiring these police checks to be performed on prospective parents the state government is taking responsibility for its citizens, albeit in this instance for its potential citizens. By ensuring that only those couples who can prove that they would not be a possible danger to their future children are assisted in conceiving, the government seems to be hoping to avoid problems down the line with people who are perhaps unfit to be parents. 

Moreover, for the majority of those people who are willing to go to such lengths to have children – the emotional, physical and financial burden of these treatments is indeed great – having to obtain a police check should be only a small added requirement in the process and should pose no difficulties.

Downsides to the legislation

However, what right does the government have to legislate who should be a parent and who should not? Certainly they would not propose to intercede in cases where a couple may conceive naturally. So why would they intervene in the case of couples receiving Assisted Reproductive Treatment? 

In a process that is already draining for all those involved, to have to prove that one should be a parent is surely an impediment too far. It can also add undue stress at a time of heightened emotions and tensions. In addition, while those couples who have always lived in Australia may find it a simple procedure to obtain a police check, due to the ease and speed at which police checks can be obtained in Australia, those couples who have spent time overseas have often found it difficult to obtain police checks from other countries.

For instance, in an article in the Herald Sun, they identified that for those who have previously lived in the United Kingdom, obtaining a police check for the purpose of obtaining IVF can be very difficult indeed. Many applications for these checks have been rejected as a waste of police time and resources, or they have been greatly delayed. It also indicated that obtaining these checks from the United States, Middle Eastern and African countries, and Japan was proving particularly problematic. For couples desperate to have a child, delays due to something like a police check could be unbearable.

There is even opposition to this by the IVF clinics themselves. At Melbourne IVF, on the same webpage that they explain the existing legislation in relation to this issue, they also point out that they are opposed to the legislation and direct patients to send their concerns to the appropriate parliament member or get in touch with an infertility group that seeks to campaign for the rights of couples receiving Assisted Reproductive Treatment.