Dawn Ostrem
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Oct 24/01) - Shelley Strong and Nadine Scott are willing to fight as long and hard as it takes to change adoption laws in the Northwest Territories.

They are the new faces of pioneering women. Far from traditional pioneers ploughing fields and taming the west, these women live together as a lesbian couple in a modern townhouse strewn with baby toys and accessories.

Shelley Strong looks over collected documents and articles from their fight, while Nadine Scott and Kindred look on. - Dawn Ostrem/NNSL photo

One-year-old Kindred is Strong's biological daughter, conceived by artificial insemination. Kindred is Scott's daughter in all ways that are not considered legal -- changing diapers, feeding her and wrapping her in the love of a mother, Scott said, adding, "I want to adopt Kindred."

"We are prepared to keep going until (the Adoption Act) gets changed," Strong added, sitting beside Scott and Kindred on the couch in their living room.

Both women started the fight to have the Adoption Act changed to allow same-sex partners to adopt each other's children in March.

Scott applied to the Department of Health and Social Services to adopt the little girl but, the application was rejected in April.

Since then, the women found a lawyer, called their MLA and other politicians to have changes made to the legislation without going to court.

Now, with no concrete action, the couple is gearing up to launch civil action.

"We want to give the government a chance to make the right decision but we are not willing to wait three years," Strong said.

The next session of the legislative assembly started yesterday (Oct. 23) but if progress is not made, Strong and Scott plan to start legal action after Christmas.

"It's about Kindred," Scott said. "She has the right to know she has legal security."

As it stands, Scott, an operating room nurse who works to support the family, cannot sign consent slips or take over custody of Kindred if something were to happen to Strong.

"The government has more important battles to fight than this," Strong said. "But, if they want to spend taxpayers money and take it to court they could."

The outlook for Strong and Scott looks good, in the long run, according to comments from deputy minister of justice Gerry Sutton.

He said the government is currently doing a comprehensive, co-ordinated review on all same-sex legislation.

"We are making progress very quickly," he said. "I don't know if it will be done in this session but a decision will be made soon."

But that might not be soon enough.

The women's lawyer, Sheila MacPherson, did not hesitate to say that if the process takes too long for them, the government would have a fair chance of losing a court battle.

Adoption is a provincial or territorial issue and at least three provinces have already changed their acts to give same-sex partners legal rights regarding children.

"In a number of other jurisdictions court cases have been successful," MacPherson said. "I think it is a pretty good chance it is a solid case and there is a fair body of case law out there."

She also said she has received "enormous" co-operation from other jurisdictions in getting research and information.

There are five lawyers at MacPherson's firm working on Strong's and Scott's potential case, in which money is not an issue, the lawyer said.

"We are doing this because we believe this is the right thing to do."