Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s desire to defend and promote the traditional family is evident in her offensive against the civil registration of children born of surrogate mothers. Milan City Council, which is particularly flexible in this area, has been called to order by the ministry of interior.
Same-sex unions were legalised in Italy in 2016, but without including the right to adoption for these couples. As a result, the status of children raised within these unions is supposed to be dealt with on a case-by-case basis by the Italian courts. Some municipalities such as Milan have approved an offensive policy to automatically register children born through surrogacy—prohibited in Italy—or through medically assisted procreation.
The centre-left and Ecologist mayor Beppe Sala was forced to stop this practice, following a letter from the ministry of interior, reminding him that it was up to the courts alone to decide on the registration of these children.
In reaction to the government’s policy, a demonstration was held in Milan on Saturday, March 18th in support of Mayor Beppe Sala. Elly Schlein, recently elected leader of the centre-left Democratic Party, was among the opposition figures present at the demonstration. The Milanese mayor announced that he would comply with the government’s request but would continue to fight for the recognition of the rights of same-sex parents in other ways.
Meloni’s call to order comes as the European Union is trying to impose a regulation aimed at establishing an undifferentiated European certificate of filiation, regardless of the nature of the family and the origin of the children—homosexual or heterosexual union, birth by biological filiation or by surrogate mother. This system will eventually force European countries that do not recognise surrogacy to register the non-biological filiation of children conceived in this way in their civil status. “All children should have the same rights, regardless of how they were conceived or born, and regardless of their family type,” explained Didier Reynders, the European Commissioner for Justice, in December 2022. The Italian Senate voted on March 14th to reject the EU regulation.
The response to the EU regulation and the Milan case has reignited the debate on surrogacy in Italy. The prime minister justifies her action by defending the rights of women, whom she considers to be “the first victims of gender ideology,” as she explained in an interview with the women’s magazine Grazia. Minister for Equal Opportunities and the Family Eugenia Roccella, described the use of surrogacy as a “child market.” Furthermore, Meloni would plan to pass a bill in the next months against ‘procreative tourism,’ designed to discourage parents wishing to use a surrogate mother abroad through deterrent fines and airport controls.
Giorgia Meloni made the defence of the traditional family against the pressures of the LGBT lobby one of her main communication axes during the campaign that led her to power in September 2022.
