Report on the Family and the Rights of Children French National Assembly, Paris, January 25, 2006

After a year of work and travel to various countries, listening to and discussing all points of view, a 30 member multi party commission of the French National Assembly recently submitted its report on the evolution of the family and the need to adapt family law to changes in the family and the rights of children. "The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State". (United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, article 16.) Faced with the desire by individuals to choose their own family structure models, increasing family breakup and new scientific possibilities, the report attempts to protect the basic unit of the family while taking into account these societal changes.
The commission believes that laws should set norms in order to "allow individuals to build their lives around stable, sure and understandable criteria." Laws should not simply validate changing mores. Articles 3, 7, 9, 18, and 21 of the New York U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child
(1989) set out the rights of children. The commission stresses that "to systematically give preference to adult aspirations over respect for these rights is not possible any more." The commission deems it essential to enshrine article 3 -
"In all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration." - into French law to help guide judges, individuals and other institutions.
Children represent the future of society. They "must not suffer from conditions imposed upon them by adults". "The best interests of the child must prevail over adult freedoms... even including the lifestyle choices of parents".
Marriage, adoption and medically assisted reproduction are inseparable. "Countries that have opened up marriage to same sex couples have all authorized adoption by these couples and developed systems to assist procreation, including surrogate motherhood, in order to allow these couples to have children."

(189 of the 195 countries world-wide agree that children's rights to a mother and father are more important than selfish adult "desires and attempts at lifestyle validation")