'It makes the world of difference': Benefits for children of lesbian parents of having their parents legally recognised as their parents

Across Australia, if a woman who gives birth has a male partner, he is able to be recognised and registered on the birth certificate as the child's legal parent, whether or not he is the child's biological parent (e.g. following donor insemination). In some parts of Australia, the law has been changed to allow a birth mother's female partner who is in the same position to be recognised and registered as the child's legal parent, but in other parts of Australia, this is still not the case. Discriminatory parentage (and other family-related) laws are regarded by both those who support them and those who oppose them as marking out same-sex parented families as less acceptable or desirable than other families, or even, as not families at all. Based on the Australian Conceiving the Family: Lesbian Mothers' Decisions, Experiences and Well-being, and the Current Legal, Public Policy and Discursive Context project, this article presents a summary of the reasons that changes in parentage laws have been extensively called for, and the benefits arising from such changes, with a focus on the needs and well-being of children.