| From the Ontario Government website | June 1, 2009 |
Starting today, adopted adults and birth parents can get more information about their past.
Ontario's adoption records are now open for the first time since 1927.
Ontario is making it easier for many Ontarians to look for information about their birth relatives. The Access to Adoption Records Act, 2008 gives adopted adults and birth parents access to information that is currently sealed in their adoption records. Adopted adults and birth parents can also protect their privacy by filing a disclosure veto or no contact notice.
GETTING INFORMATION
Once they reach the age of 18, adopted individuals can apply for copies of their birth registration and adoption order. Birth parents can also apply once the adopted adult has reached the age of 19. While there is no standard for adoption orders, they may contain:
PROTECTING PRIVACY
Adopted adults and birth parents who want to protect their privacy can also file:
FINDING FAMILY
While the Access to Adoption Records Act, 2008 helps people find their birth and adoption information, it does not help them locate their family. People who want to get in touch with their birth relatives can add their name to Ontario's voluntary Adoption Disclosure Register.
Individuals should contact ServiceOntario to apply for information from their birth and adoption records. This service is free.
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| From the Ontario Government website | May 14, 2008 |
A new Ontario law will soon give adult adoptees and birth parents access to information that is currently sealed in their adoption records.
For years, adoptees and birth parents have worked to get personal and family information from their original birth certificates and adoption records. Ontario's new law will help adoptees find out what their original names were, as well as who their birth parents were. It could also help birth parents learn the name their child was given after he or she was adopted.
The law includes a new disclosure veto for adoptions that take place before September 1, 2008, and maintains no contact notices for all adoptions registered in Ontario.
Adoptees and birth parents can begin to apply for disclosure vetoes in September 2008. Adoptees and birth parents will be able to apply for information from their adoption records starting in June 2009.
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| From the Adoption Council of Canada website | November 3, 2005 |
On Nov. 1, 2005 Bill 183, the Adoption Information Disclosure Act, 2005 passed the Ontario legislature by a vote of 68 to 19.
Though the bill became law on receiving royal assent Nov. 3, it actually goes into effect in 18 months - the Ontario government will use the delay to work out the operational details and to publicize the changes.
Under the new system, adoptees and birth parents can access records that were previously sealed. Adoptees can learn their original name, and birth parents can learn the current name of a child they placed for adoption. These details could ultimately lead to reuniting a long-separated parent and child.
There are now four Canadian provinces which have unsealed their adoption records: British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Newfoundland. However Ontario remains the only province without a "disclosure veto", which would allow anyone to keep their records sealed if they specifically requested it.
The Ontario legislation does give birth parents and adoptees the option to request they not be contacted (a "contact veto"), but to keep their records sealed they would need to prove to the Child and Family Services Review Board that revealing their identifying information would cause harm.
The Adoption Council of Canada has fully supported Bill 183 and the position of the Coalition for Open Adoption Records. See "Open Records: ACC Backs Bill 183". The Adoption Council of Ontario has supported the bill as well.
The Coalition for Open Adoption Records (COAR), which has been pushing hard to get adoption records unsealed in Ontario, called it "the most progressive adoption disclosure law in North America." According to Wendy Rowney of the COAR Coordinating Committee, "Ontario is now the only jurisdiction in North America to permit both adopted adults and their birth parents unrestricted access to identifying information. We are thrilled that the government has recognized our absolute right to this information."
NOTE: this is a GeoCities site and Geo is closing it's doors near the end of 2009.
The new law eliminates the Adoption Disclosure Register and all of its functions including the release of non-identifying information. However, says Wendy Rowney, the government has promised COAR that it plans to continue releasing background information to adopted adults and birth parents.
[there's more information in the article]
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| From CNEWS newspaper... | Mon, Oct. 13, 2003 |
By MURRAY BREWSTER
HALIFAX (CP) - Provincial governments throughout most of Canada could be doing a lot more to help adopted children find their birth parents, says the draft report of a UN committee.
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child met in Geneva last month to review Ottawa's record of implementing an international convention designed to improve protection for children throughout the world. "The committee is concerned by the fact that certain provinces do not recognize the right of an adopted child to know, as far as possible, her/his biological parents," said an Oct. 3 draft report obtained by The Canadian Press.
"The committee notes that while adoption falls within the jurisdiction of the provinces and territories, the ratification of the Hague Convention has not been followed up by legal and other appropriate measures in all provinces."
While the UN report does not name the provinces, an expatriate Canadian who lobbied the commission on the adoption issue in Geneva said Nova Scotia tops the list when it comes to keeping records closed.
"It's an absolute disgrace," Ron Murdock said in a recent interview from Amsterdam.
The other provinces that restrict access to adoption records are New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Ontario, Manitoba and Quebec.
"What we're asking for is not painful reunions," said Murdock, who was adopted out of the infamous Ideal Maternity Home in Chester, N.S., which was chronicled in the book Butterbox Babies.
"Opening adoption records does not automatically mean painful reunions are thrust on people who don't want to meet. What open adoption records should entail is: release of information and then contact, but only if desired."
In a submission to the UN Commission, Murdock argued that Canada was violating the international charter on the protection of children by allowing provinces to continue their restrictive practices.
"How can you sign the United Nations charter on the rights of children and have sealed adoption records?" he asked.
"The charter clearly states that a child has the right to know who it is and from whence it comes."
While the commission did not go as far as to say Canada is in breach of the agreement, Murdock said, it's clearly worded rebuke was heartening to see.
Murdock, 62, a singing instructor in some of Europe's best concert halls, has spent the better part of 27 years trying to get information on his biological parents. His journey began when his son was diagnosed with a mild form of autism.
With the advent of genetic screening for many diseases, it's more important than ever that adopted children have access to their records, according to a group that represents birth mothers.
"There are thousands of inherited diseases," said Karen Lynn of the Canadian Council of Natural Mothers, which supported Murdock's submission.
"If you have a group of people who can access knowledge about their inherited diseases and another that can't, it amounts to discrimination. This is what has emerged with modern medicine and the ability to identify in advance genetic disease."
Nova Scotia was singled out by Murdock, not only because it was his birthplace, but because of the Conservative government's spectacular failure four years ago to open up the system.
In the fall of 1999, the newly elected government of Premier John Hamm moved quickly to fulfill a campaign promise of more open access to adoption information.
The bill was withdrawn after an emotional and bitter debate through public hearings and in the legislature.
"The bill was shot to pieces in the house," said Mike Slayter of Parent Finders Nova Scotia.
"I suspect it will take a court to order the province to open adoption records now."
The province has taken what critics have described as a couple of meek steps forward by telling new birth and adoptive parents that their records may be opened years down the road, but has staunchly refused to open older files.
"The understanding that was in place when the birth parents gave up the child for adoption was that their identities would be protected," said David Morse, Nova Scotia's community services minister.
"This is a really sensitive area."
The only way adoptees and birth parents can be reunited now in the province is if one or the other contacts the government, which will make discrete inquiries to see if contact is desired.
Morse said there are no plans to rewrite the legislation in the near future, although provincial officials will study the UN commission report.
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| From London Free Press newspaper | September 12, 2005 |
TORONTO - The Ontario government won't undermine its own controversial plan to unseal the province's adoption records by allowing birth parents or adoptees the option of keeping their details secret, says Social Services Minister Sandra Pupatello.
On the eve of committee hearings into the legislation which get underway this week, Pupatello said adding a so-called disclosure veto, which critics have been calling for, would negate the entire point of the new law.
"The whole point of the bill itself was to eliminate the fact that people don't have access to information that the United Nations declared they have a right to," Pupatello said.
"If it was ever the intent to have a veto, we would simply leave it as it is today - there would be no point to having a bill."
Conservative member Norm Sterling said he wants the government to scrap the bill and start over because the retroactive legislation doesn't give all birth parents and adoptees the right to keep their records private.
"It still does not meet the test in terms of providing people with privacy - privacy they were promised as long ago as 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago when mothers had children and gave them up for adoption," he said.
Sterling said the Conservatives will push their case when the committee resumes its clause-by-clause examination of the bill.
As it now stands, the legislation would allow birth parents to access the current birth certificate and name of the child they gave up for adoption. It would also allow the same access to adoptees, allowing them to learn the names of their birth parents.
The government has insisted that mothers who gave up children for adoption would remain anonymous, but that's not the case, said New Democrat critic Marilyn Churley, herself a mother who gave up a son to adoption years ago before the pair were reunited.
Churley said a birth mother's surname was often put on the adoption order held by the adoptive parents.
Pupatello, however, insisted the government has taken a long, hard look at the bill over the summer to ensure it provides the necessary protections, which the current legislation doesn't have.
"I am very pleased with the safeguards that we've put into the system."
The bill does include a no-contact provision, so a birth parent or adoptee can request not to be contacted once their information is released. The penalty for disobeying is a hefty $50,000 fine.
Sterling, however, said he considers the contact veto a "farce."
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| From CNEWS newspaper [actual article no longer available] | September 11, 2005 |
TORONTO (CP) - The Ontario government won't undermine its own controversial plan to unseal the province's adoption records by allowing birth parents or adoptees the option of keeping their details secret, says Social Services Minister Sandra Pupatello.
On the eve of committee hearings into the legislation which get underway this week, Pupatello said adding a so-called disclosure veto, which critics have been calling for, would negate the entire point of the new law.
"The whole point of the bill itself was to eliminate the fact that people don't have access to information that the United Nations declared they have a right to," Pupatello said in an interview late last week.
"If it was ever the intent to have a veto, we would simply leave it as it is today - there would be no point to having a bill."
Conservative member Norm Sterling said he wants the government to scrap the bill and start over because the retroactive legislation doesn't give all birth parents and adoptees the right to keep their records private.
"It still does not meet the test in terms of providing people with privacy - privacy they were promised as long ago as 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago when mothers had children and gave them up for adoption," he said.
Sterling said the Conservatives will push their case when the committee resumes its clause-by-clause examination of the bill.
As it now stands, the legislation would allow birth parents to access the current birth certificate and name of the child they gave up for adoption. It would also allow the same access to adoptees, allowing them to learn the names of their birth parents.
The government has insisted that mothers who gave up children for adoption would remain anonymous, but that's not the case, said New Democrat critic Marilyn Churley, herself a mother who gave up a son to adoption years ago before the pair were reunited.
Churley said a birth mother's surname was often put on the adoption order held by the adoptive parents.
Pupatello, however, insisted the government has taken a long, hard look at the bill over the summer to ensure it provides the necessary protections, which the current legislation doesn't have.
"I am very pleased with the safeguards that we've put into the system."
The bill does include a no-contact provision, so a birth parent or adoptee can request not to be contacted once their information is released. The penalty for disobeying is a hefty $50,000 fine.
Sterling, however, said he considers the contact veto a "farce."
One change the government did make to the legislation earlier this year was to add an option for a birth mother or adoptee to keep their records sealed if they can prove to a tribunal that unsealing those records would result in harm.
The government's amendments to the bill have been "patchwork" and done only after the Conservatives and Ontario's privacy commissioner complained women might take drastic action, including suicide, if they couldn't keep their records secret, Sterling charged.
"My belief is this bill now is badly damaged because the government has changed its mind partially midstream," he said, urging the government to examine laws in B.C., Alberta and Newfoundland which include a disclosure veto.
The new legislation will offer more protection to adoptees and birth parents than they have now, Pupatello said, and is particularly important in the era of the Internet, which has made it easier than ever for parents and children to track each other down.
"We are creating a system for protection," Pupatello said. "That currently does not exist."
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