Western Australian gay couple Trent and Brad Dunn have won a Supreme Court fight to have a baby via surrogacy; the first same-sex couple to receive approval from the Reproductive Technology Council of WA.
Three years ago, Trent and Brad Dunn took their fight to court when they were told the Surrogacy Act 2008 required couples accessing surrogacy to be heterosexual.
The couple challenged the laws, convincing the Court of Appeal that not allowing them to pursue surrogacy was discrimination, breaching federal anti-discrimination laws.
“This has been a really long journey for us and for our family, for our surrogate’s family, for our egg donor’s family; it’s been incredibly long,” Brad Dunn told WAToday on Friday.
Until the end of 2025, Western Australia was the only place in the country that banned altruistic surrogacy for gay and single men.
The changes to surrogacy reform will begin in mid-2027. They will remove discriminatory barriers that prevent certain members of the LGBTQIA+ community from being able to start a family of their own.
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‘Time’s really crucial’
“Western Australia is the last state to allow surrogacy for same-sex couples within Australia to be able to proceed and get treatment,” Brad said.
“And even with legislation being promised to be brought in, I believe some time next year, this has been something that’s taken a really long time, and every time we pleaded, every time we begged for it to happen, all we were responded with was just wait, be patient, it’ll come.”
“For a lot of people going through any type of treatment, any type of journey along the same lines, know that time’s really precious, time’s really crucial.
“Just waiting and waiting and waiting all the time isn’t always an option, and that’s an incredibly hard thing to be told to do consistently.”
Brad said he wanted to make it clear to everyone about what the pair are going through entering the surrogacy process.
“It’s about the over a year of counselling,” he said, “A year of psychology assessments, it’s the medical tests.”
“It’s the legal documents that you have to form to make every single decision before anything has even occurred. Every potential outcome that may occur has to be decided. Then you send that to a group of people you’ve never met to decide if they’re going to let you proceed down this path or not.”
He said the couple met every criteria bar one, “the fact that we were two men”. That was the only reason they couldn’t continue with the surrogacy process.
“Because we weren’t a heterosexual couple, so we were deemed unfit in that legislation,” Brad told 9 Perth News.
They have started treatment with a surrogate, her wife and a separate egg donor.
Trent and Brad Dunn win Supreme Court fight to have a baby via surrogate‘This home will be loving’
“We know plenty of challenges still lie ahead of us, but we are overjoyed to be focused now on the wonderful opportunity of parenthood,” Brad said.
“This home will be safe, this home will be loving, and this home will be nurturing.”
Their win paves the way for other same-sex couples to do the same before the reform changes. Trent and Brad have created a template document based on their surrogacy arrangement which others can use.
“If it means that someone doesn’t have to experience that same pain and it can be streamlined for them, then this has been worth it,” Brad said.
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