Certificat de naissance : la directive qui soulage les parents
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Thursday, August 25, 2011
Certificat de naissance : la directive qui soulage les parents
Vous rappelez-vous d'Heather Mattingsley, dont la journaliste Jenn Hardy avait raconté la touchante histoire dans OpenFile, à la fin du mois d'août ? Madame Mattingsley, qui vit à Montréal, ne parvenait pas à obtenir du Directeur de l'état civil un certificat de naissance pour sa fille Sunshine Rose, alors âgée de 5 mois.
Heather Mattingsley avait accouché, avec l'assistance d'une sage-femme non certifiée. Elle ne pouvait donc pas présenter le constat de naissance demandé par l'administration, le document n'étant valable que s'il est signé par un médecin ou une sage-femme assermentée. La jeune mère aurait bien voulu accoucher dans un centre des naissances, mais comme beaucoup de femmes montréalaises, elle était sur liste d'attente pour deux d'entre eux.
Après plusieurs mois d'attente, de démarche et d'angoisse, l'heure est au soulagement pour Heather Mattingsley. Le Directeur de l'état civil l'a en effet informée qu'elle recevra le certificat de naissance, sans être obligée de se soumettre à un examen médical pour prouver qu'elle est la mère de la petite Sunshine Rose. « Nous avons reçu, il y a trois semaines, une lettre de confirmation que le certificat de naissance allait bientôt nous être délivré », explique Madame Mattingsley. Grâce à cette lettre, elle a déjà pu obtenir un numéro d'assurance sociale et une carte d'assurance maladie pour sa fille.
Cependant, d'autres parents sont ou se retrouveront peut-être dans l'impossibilité de fournir un constat de naissance. Afin de leur offrir une solution de secours, le Directeur de l'état civil a pris une directive datée du 12 septembre et déjà en vigueur.
Marie Godbout, sa porte-parole, explique que « le rapport médical de la naissance est toujours demandé, mais, dans certaines circonstances exceptionnelles qui le justifient, le Directeur de l'état civil peut également accepter une preuve civile. »
Cette preuve civile est une lettre d'un ou des parents dans laquelle ils exposent les raisons pour lesquelles ils ne sont pas en mesure de fournir un constat médical. Ce courrier doit être accompagné d'au moins deux déclarations assermentées par des témoins qui n'ont aucun lien avec l'enfant, ni avec les parents, comme un voisin, une amie ou un collègue, par exemple. Les témoins doivent préciser leurs coordonnées et fournir des informations précises, comme la nature de leur relation avec les parents.
Les dossiers complets, c'est-à-dire ne requérant pas d'informations complémentaires, seront alors traités dans les mêmes délais que les autres, selon Madame Godbout. Les parents bénéficieront d'un accompagnement pour faciliter leurs démarches.
Heather Mattingsley est très heureuse de cette nouvelle directive « pour toutes les mères - et elles sont nombreuses - qui rencontrent le même problème. Grâce à cette directive, elles n'auront pas les mêmes soucis que moi. Ce sera plus facile pour elles. C'est bien que le Directeur de l'état civil ait effectué ce changement. »
Au Québec, il y a près de 90 000 naissances par année. Le nombre de femmes qui accouchent avec des sages-femmes non certifiées reste inconnu, mais des signes indiquent que cette pratique serait de plus en plus répandue.
« Le Directeur de l'état civil doit faire preuve de grande prudence au moment d'inscrire un acte de naissance au registre d'état civil du Québec. Il y a des impacts importants en délivrant le certificat, car il servira de base pour obtenir des documents, des programmes et des services gouvernementaux », rappelle Marie Godbout. Le but de l'administration est ainsi d'éviter tout cas de fraude classique, de contrat de mère-porteuse.
Le texte de la directive sera disponible dans quelques jours sur le site du Directeur de l'état civil du Québec.
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Montreal mother struggles to convince govt she gave birth to baby girl
She’s more than five months old and Sunshine Rose still doesn’t have a birth certificate. She doesn’t have a social insurance number or a Quebec health card. As far as the province is concerned, she doesn’t exist.
Her mother, Heather Mattingsley, said that in the past five months the Directeur de l'état civil – the government agency responsible for issuing birth certificates in Quebec – has been making her “jump through hoops” to get her daughter’s birth registered. “They say we’re not showing them enough evidence that I gave birth to this baby,” Mattingsley told OpenFile. “But I have gone above and beyond what they need. They are asking for the impossible.”
On March 12, 2011, Mattingsley gave birth to the healthy baby girl at home. Delivering a baby at home is legal in Quebec, but only a certified midwife has the legal right to professionally assist a homebirth.*
But like the majority of women who want their births attended by a midwife in Quebec, Mattingsley didn’t have that option. The birthing centre waiting lists are long. One out of every five women who want a midwife in Montreal will actually get one, and birthing centres give priority to women who have already delivered a baby under their care, making it very difficult for first-time mothers.
Mattingsley put her name on two of the city’s birthing centre waiting lists as soon as she found out she was pregnant. But she never received a phone call saying there was a place for her, so she began to search for alternatives.
To avoid a hospital birth, Mattingsley, who works in a café, paid $2,000 to an “underground” midwife who illegally delivers babies in Montreal.
While the pregnancy, labour and birth were smooth sailing, Mattingsley has been trying since her daughter was 13 days old to get her birth registered.
On March 25 she mailed the Directeur de l'état civil everything she was told she would need to obtain her baby’s birth certificate — a letter from a doctor stating he saw her with a newborn whose age corresponded with the day she says she gave birth (this is required of mothers who did not deliver a child under the care of a registered midwife or doctor—for example, by choice or in the back of a cab), a copy of an ultrasound report from her pregnancy, and the Attestation of Birth which was signed by a friend who acted as a witness.
A week after this was sent in, Mattingsley received a letter asking for more information. The government agency wanted a letter from the doctor who followed Mattinglsey during her pregnancy – except she didn’t have one because her illegal midwife provided care while she was pregnant. The government agency wanted a report from her doctor following a physical exam to prove she had given birth – except she was told by two doctors that at that point, there was no physical exam that could be done to prove she gave birth to her daughter because too much time had passed.
The government agency also took exception to Mattingsley’s use of a friend as the witness for the Attestation of Birth, telling her “according to Quebec legislation only a physician or a midwife can attest to the birth of a child.” (Because Mattingsley's midwife is operating illegally in Quebec, her signature is not acceptable.)
Over the next few weeks, Mattingsley said a number of people phoned her from the Directeur de l'état civil and she was asked to provide more documentation. She was asked to get a doctor to sign the ultrasound, but the doctor was on vacation. Another time, a doctor’s letter was rejected because it was hand-written, not typed. “I became a little discouraged and gave up,” Mattingsley said.
She resumed her mission to have her child registered with the province recently when she and her partner decided they want to move to British Columbia in October. But those plans will likely have to be put on hold until their daughter’s birth is registered.
Marie Godbout, spokeswoman for the Directeur de l'état civil could not comment directly on Mattinglsey's case, but said a mother who delivers a baby without a doctor or legal midwife has to have a medical exam to attest to a recent birth.
“The Directeur de l'état civil must have no doubt about the biological connection between mother and child,” Godbout said. “The Declaration of Birth is a very important document that we need our whole lives. Measures taken in the public interest ensure that there is no falsification of these documents.”
According to Lysane Grégoire, president of Groupe Maman, an advocacy group for women’s rights around birth, Mattingsley’s situation is not unique. In fact, it’s so common that Groupe Maman is taking action. “We’re collecting testimonies of women who have been having difficulties having their children registered,” Grégoire said. “We’re in contact with lawyers to see what can be done so the rights of these women are respected.”
“There is no law that obligates a woman to give birth with a professional assistant. And when you just want to do something as basic as have your child registered in the system, you shouldn’t have to have a medical exam. It’s abusive.”
After five months of back and forth with the Directeur de l'état civil, Mattingsley says she is just wants to move forward. But she’s not sure what to do next and wonders if she will end up having to pay for a DNA test to prove she is Sunshine Rose's mother.
Despite the difficulty she’s had registering her daughter’s birth, she has no regrets about giving birth at home.
“Our midwife was worth every penny. We got everything we wanted with our home birth and the prenatal and postnatal care was amazing.”
CORRECTION AUGUST 25, 2011: The original version of this article incorrectly stated that delivering a baby at home is legal in Quebec, so long as it’s done through one of the city’s birthing centres. It would be more accurate to say that it is always legal for a mother to deliver at home, but only a certified midwife has the legal right to professionally assist a homebirth. A mother has the right to deliver alone or with whomever she wishes, no law forces her to a obtain professional assistance.
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Praticising medicine without a licence is a crime everywhere in Canada, and I can't believe anyone would be so stupid and selfish as to put an innocent child's health at risk by using an unauthorized and therefore incompetent physician. All the more disgusting that Ms Mattingsley did so to save a few bucks (as reported in the Gazette). I hope in the future that the Directeur de l'état civil du Québec only agrees to issue a birth certificate on condition that the criminal is identified (i.e., the person having provided the unlicenced medical services).
Thanks for this article about a quite unknown issue, but which may have important consequences for women's rights in the future. I would like to add that those requirements from the Directeur de l'État civil are absolutely and historically new, since no woman in the past had to "medically" proove a pregnancy nor a childbirth. A civil witness was the only requirement in that matter, which is - essentially - civil. Not medical. It is also an important issue of men/women equality, since a man just has to put is name and sign the birth declaration to be recognized as the father of the child, nothing more is asked of him, no "biological" proof needed. It is the responsibility of the Directeur de l'État civil to find proof that the parents are making a false statement, declaring wrongfully a birth, not the responsilility of the parents, who have a lot a witnesses, to proove they say the truth! Meanwhile, the child's right to an identity and a nationality is denied, whereas the first legal obligation of the Directeur de l'État civil is to provide it to the child promptly.
Yes, for centuries women and their offspring also commonly died during childbirth. This is why the state and health services became involved - for the lucky few around the turn of the 20th century and for everyone around the 1950s.
Thank you for your comment and correction. We have made the correction and included an explanatory note.
Not surprising at all... In my social circle many have had the same problems as they have birthed with an underground midwife or choose to birth unassisted completely. It seems to be so random, who has problems and who doesn't, there is no consistency at all. I was lucky that both times I gave birth unassisted, I had a contact that could write letter saying that she saw me even though she hadn't. I was never asked for any proof of pregnancy, nor did I have an ultrasound or see anyone after I gave birth. On the statement I simply inserted my name in all of the places stating that I gave birth alone without the aid of anyone else.
As I said, I was lucky. I know some moms that fought for nearly a year before finally getting their children registered and even then they had to jump through so many hoops and lived in stress for that whole time.
It was one of my main worries while pregnant and provided a lot of stress.
I feel the need to correct one thing in the article. "Delivering a baby at home is legal in Quebec, so long as it’s done through one of the city’s birthing centres." This is not exactly true. Giving birth with a midwife is only legal when done through one of the birthing centres, however, giving birth at home is always legal.