‘Birthing parent’ gets the boot

NDIS and Government Services Minister Bill Shorten has directed officials to replace the term ‘birthing parent’ with ‘mother’ on all government forms.

Bill Shorten wants ‘mother’ back on official forms. Picture: AAP

NDIS and Government Services Minister Bill Shorten has directed officials to replace the term “birthing parent” with “mother” on all government forms, following backlash from some parents who felt the new term was “exclusionary” to new mothers.

The decision to replace the term “birthing parent” follows a program established under the former government, which was trialling the phrase in three hospitals. The pilot, called “Birth of a Child”, was designed to help make it easier for parents to enrol and register their newborns with Medicare by reducing the number of forms needing to be filled out.

Mr Shorten on Thursday confirmed the pilot would be scrapped after The Daily Telegraph reported a new mother was angered by the forms.

“Just regarding the story in the Daily Tele about a form that was part of a pilot program launched in three hospitals under the previous Coalition government,” Mr Shorten said.

“When I was informed of this situation yesterday, I instructed the responsible officials they should cease using the previous government’s forms.”

Mr Shorten said the change would bring hospital forms in line with Medicare, which does not use the term “birthing parent”.

“They will be replaced with new forms that use the word mother, not birthing parent, which is consistent with other Medicare forms,” Mr Shorten said.

His direction came after Giggle social app chief executive Sall Grover told The Daily Telegraph she was shocked to see the paperwork that asked her to sign off as a “birthing parent” after she delivered her child.

“On the form to put our newborn baby on our Medicare card, we are referred to as ‘birthing parent’. Enough is enough,” Ms Grover said. “This absolute bullshit is exclusionary, alienating and derogatory towards every woman (who) wants to be and is called ‘mother’.”

Services Australia said three hospitals were participating in the pilot, which had processed about 1100 parents.

The agency told the newspaper that it had positive feedback when testing the language before launching the trial.

“The term ‘birthing parent’ is being used in a consent form provided to parents participating in the Birth of a Child pilot,” Services Australia general manager Hank Jongen said.

“This language was tested before being trialled.”