A committee of regular NWT MLAs is inviting the public to share their views on proposed changes to vital statistics legislation.
The NWT legislature’s Social Development Committee is reviewing Bill 40, which passed second reading last month and proposes changes to the territory’s Vital Statistics Act.
If the bill becomes law in its current form, it would allow anyone aged 16 years or older to apply to change the gender on their birth certificate.
The bill also proposes making the sex field optional on birth certificates, would allow up to four people to register as the parents of a child on a birth certificate, and provide a process to register home births without medical assistance, among other changes.
A public hearing on Bill 40 is set to take place at the Legislative Assembly on Monday, April 27 at 7pm and will be streamed live on the assembly’s social media pages.
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The committee of MLAs reviewing the bill is inviting people to attend the hearing to share their views in person. People can also submit their views in writing to the committee by email ahead of the hearing.
Bill 40 must pass a third reading in the legislature and be granted royal assent by the Commissioner of the NWT before it becomes law.
In a plain language summary of Bill 40, the NWT government said the bill aims to amend the Vital Statistics Act to reflect modern “notions about gender and family structure” and align with decisions in provincial human rights cases. The territory said that includes recognition of non-binary and transgender people as well as polyamorous families with more than two parents of a child.
The GNWT said other changes proposed in the bill are “procedural in nature.”
The territorial government said it also plans to update NWT’s Change of Name Act to allow people aged 16 years and older to apply for a legal name change. It said transgender and non-binary people will also be able to request that their legal name change not be published in the Northwest Territories Gazette.
