Law Times

Law Times • apriL 9, 2018 Page 15 www.lawtimesnews.com Platonic parenting joining the mainstream BY DALE SMITH For Law Times P latonic parenting is a growing trend where close friends who don't have a spousal relation- ship are raising children, oc- casionally through adoption, though some of Ontario's laws contain language that assumes a spousal relationship is at play. Lawyers who are handling fam- ily matters governed by these laws say they are ensuring that they get challenged. Marta Siemiarczuk, a lawyer with Nelligan O'Brien Payne LLP in Ottawa, is currently awaiting a court decision of a constitutional challenge she filed in Ontario Superior Court with regards to two friends who have fostered a girl through Ontario's Children's Aid Society and want to adopt her, but the Child and Family Services Act insists that there be a spousal relationship for adoptions. "Right now, in order for two people to adopt a child together through CAS or a licensee, you have to be spouses," says Siemiarczuk. "One can adopt no problem, but if two people are applying jointly, you have to be spouses." Siemiarczuk notes that her clients have been best friends for more than a decade, have lived together for most of that time and through fostering a baby girl who was placed with them at three days old have decided to adopt her three years later. "We mounted a constitution- al challenge saying those provi- sions discriminate on the basis of marital status, and hopefully a month or so from now, we get a positive result," says Siemiar- czuk. She says the counter- argument put forward is that there is something inherent in a spousal relationship that binds a couple together, but she notes that we are in an era of divorce. Siemiarczuk says that, over the past 10 or 15 years, there has been a social and legal evolution of what a family is, especially with the evolution of reproduc- tive technology. "As we move away from the traditional two parents and two-and-a-half-kids family, we see more single parents, more blended families," says Siemiar- czuk. "Socially, it's evolving, and the law is trying to catch up with that." On Jan. 1, 2017, the Ontario government updated family law and succession law statutes to deal with the expanded recogni- tion that now includes parentage agreements for up to four par- ents of one child. Julie Stanchieri of Stanchieri Family Law in Toronto says that in light of the All Families Are Equal Act, there are likely to be more platonic parenting agree- ments. "It's obviously something that is getting to be more and more popular, and it's a really lovely idea," says Stanchieri. "There are lots of people out there who want to have a child, but they're not in a committed relationship." Stanchieri says the parent- ing agreement needs to consider living arrangements if the pla- tonic parents don't live together, general parenting ideas such as what sorts of schools they have in mind, ideas around discipline and even issues such as religion. "All of those things can be talked about and put into a par- enting agreement," says Stanch- ieri. "Some couples who are in a romantic relationship don't re- ally talk about values and history and beliefs. In a relationship like this, where there's no romantic relationship, you want to make sure your client is talking to the other party and trying to get a sense of whether their values are in sync and, if not, how would disputes be decided." Siemiarczuk says the law has evolved. "The legislature in Ontario has recognized that instead of having to go to court to prove that you're all supposed to be parents, we can do these parentage agree- ments and get over-the-counter applications for changes to regis- trations with up to four parents on them," says Siemiarczuk. She notes, however, that a parentage agreement needs to be done pre-conception and that, if there is an intention to co-parent post-conception, that remains an outstanding issue. "If you're not a biological par- ent and you haven't adopted, you cannot get recognized under the eyes of the law as a parent of a child," says Siemiarczuk. "That is still a gap." Shelley Quinn of Quinn Family Law in Toronto consid- ers this to be "front-ending" the relationship with the agreement and contemplating all of the hard questions before a spousal couple might face them and even trying to anticipate parenting styles despite the fact that they may not know until they are al- ready parents. "If I was drafting an agree- ment for two friends who want- ed to have a kid together, upfront I'd have them hooked up with a therapist to do a parenting co- ordinator role so that they had a go-to spot to work through these issues in a productive, friendly way," says Quinn. She says the agreement would be proactive with an assigned per- son for parenting co-ordination or mediation. "I'd want a mediator that, once an issue came up, they have maybe 14 days to get to that me- diator to start processing that issue to keep them on good foot- ing so that they can be the very best parents to that kid and keep conf lict out that relationship," Quinn adds. "The good thing about pla- tonic parenting is that you don't have the baggage of a relationship to worry about," says Stanchieri. "These people would be good candidates for mediation." She says that, when it comes to separate homes through di- vorce, it tends to be the conf lict that affects the children rather than living in separate homes. "If the parents are extremely co-operative and collaborative in their co-parenting approach, that child is going to be well cared for," says Stanchieri. "The goal, if you're representing in one of these contracts, is trying to get these things worked out well in advance." Stanchieri notes that because nothing can ever be written in stone, it's why thinking about dispute resolution in advance will help to prompt a discussion so that the would-be parents can come up with their own ideas about how they want their par- enting plan to look. Poroshad Mahdi, lawyer with Gelman & Associates in Toron- to, says that in cases where there have been friends who have been donors of genetic material, such as a friend with a same-sex couple, and there is a parent- ing agreement, there can still be complications. "Even aside from the fact that the Children's Law Reform Act allows you to have three parents, it's very complicated when you're attempting to schedule access," says Mahdi. "In a situation when you've got three or four parents, how do you divvy up the week- ends? There's also the additional complication of additional sib- lings from previous relation- ships." Mahdi notes that judges don't like to separate siblings, even if they're not biologically related. "No agreement entered into before the child's birth will 100-per-cent bind the court's hands, because it's always about the best interests of the child," Mahdi says. Siemiarczuk says that lawyers need to be aware of stereotyping what relationships are consid- ered to be good enough to par- ent. "I've had some interesting examples in my practice, and I think there are many scenarios out there that we're not recog- nizing," says Siemiarczuk. "As lawyers, we need to think long and hard about what is the sub- stance of the relationship and not what the name of it is." LT FAMILY LAW Untitled-4 1 2018-02-20 2:51 PM Julie Stanchieri says that in light of the All Families Are Equal Act, there are likely to be more platonic parenting agreements. No agreement entered into before the child's birth will 100-per-cent bind the court's hands, because it's always about the best interests of the child. Poroshad Mahdi LawTimesNews.com Fresh Ontario legal news and analysis available on any device. Get More Online

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