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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 10 Hansard (28 August) . . Page.. 2993 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

why community input is important. Of course, it is important in its own right. But as the government's amendments note, it will also be important in identifying problems.

In developing the changes to Western Australian legislation, my colleague Giz Watson spent some time consulting and gathering information about areas of discrimination in the lives of people.

The potential for division also means that the way that community discussion is handled is an opportunity for developing ideas for education and for reducing discrimination. There will be some who will never agree because of their particular religious views or a particularly intolerant attitude or fear of difference. Those attitudes and fear of their effects at the ballot box should not stop us from removing the discriminatory laws. The consultation can be an opportunity to develop and educate, depending on how it is handled.

I noted Mr Humphries' concerns about adoption of children. It is a good example of issues that need to be discussed in a thoughtful way. There is an interesting paper by Maurice Rickard of the social policy group of the information and research services of the Department of the Parliamentary Library. It is on children of lesbian and single-women parents. I will read a bit of it:

There is a body of research evidence, spanning over 20 years, on the developmental outcomes of children of single women and lesbian parents. This includes longitudinal studies which track the development of children over a number of years into adolescence and adulthood as well as cross-sectional studies that comparatively investigate a child's development at a single time. Results are generally consistent across these various studies, for both single women parent studies and lesbian couple parent studies ...

With regard to lesbian parenting, studies tracking the long-term progress of children of lesbian mothers have revealed no significant differences between them and children of heterosexual mothers along any of the following key developmental dimensions:

Gender development: children of lesbian parents are no more likely to have confused or unconventional gender identity or behaviour, or to have gay or lesbian sexual orientation.

Self-esteem and emotional wellbeing: the behaviour, intelligence, psychiatric and emotional condition of children of lesbian parents is within the normal range.

Social development: children of lesbian parents are within the normal range of confidence, and have positive peer relationships. They are no more likely to be teased or bullied than children of heterosexual mothers.

These longitudinal studies report on children of lesbian mothers separated from previous heterosexual relationships. There are fewer studies on children raised from infancy in lesbian parent families. Such studies nevertheless corroborate the findings of the longitudinal studies.

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