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DRAFT LAW NO. 98 /X

Amend the Code of the Civil Register and repeal the Decree-Law No 13/2001

Exhibition of reasons

The right to personal identity, enshrined in Article 26 (1) of the Constitution of the

Portuguese Republic, while corollary of the principle of the dignity of the human person,

is on the basis of the legal status of individuals, and constitutes, concurrently with the right

to primary health care and social protection, the framework for affirming citizenship

of the child, from the time of their birth.

Thus, it enshrines our Constitution that the whole person, as a singular individual and

irreducible, is holder of the right to the name and the right to its "personal historicity", i.e. to the

knowledge of the identity of the progenitors, foundation, for example, of the corresponding

right to the investigation of paternity or motherhood.

However, our legal planning does not provide for procedures that guarantee the

veracity of the statements of birth that are on the basis of the respective record, being

this fundamentally dependent on the good faith of the declarants, nor does it provide for the existence of

a database that allows to have the control of the number of births occurring in the

national health units, enabling the rapid identification of risk situations

clinical and social, so as to enable early intervention with these situations.

In the pursuit of policies for intervention and modernization of the legal framework of the protection of

children and young people in distress, with a view to ensuring the full development of any

child or young person, it was approved, by the Joint Despacho No. 1004/2000, of the Ministers of the

Work and Solidarity, Justice and Health, the Regulation of the Experimental Period

of the Citizen Birth Project, which, with the aim of identifying as soon as the birth the

situations of risk, promoted the registration of children, soon after their birth, from the

motherhood / hospital in both the civil register, and health and safety services

social.

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After the completed the trial phase was planned to generalize the Nascer Project

Citizen to all the national territory.

However, even though the project has had good acceptance by the progenitors and bring together a

widespread consensus about its importance and need for all how many in it

participate, that goal is over, without any reason, for being abandoned.

The Decree-Law No. 13/2001 of January 25 recognizing the need for the adoption of

strategies and procedures that, facilitating, soon after birth, a contact

unbureaucratized with the civil registry, make it possible to make an early intervention of the areas of

social protection of health, established a simplified, but optional, regime of

procedures for the registration of births occurring in health units,

enabling progenitors to declare the birth in the health unit itself.

Despite the initiatives taken in the matter and the fact that the birth register is

mandatory, remains the gap pointed out by the Provedory of Justice, in Recommendation n.

28 /B/99, according to which " the legal regime of the civil registry does not confer the necessary

guarantee of veracity of the declarations of birth ", enabling the registration" from

birth of any person (allowing yourself not only that people without any links

to the newborn figurem as its progenitors, such as, until, that is recorded the

birth of a child who never existed) and not ensuring that all the

births occurred in Portugal to be declared for civil registration purposes ".

In fact, no one knows concretely how many children are born in Portugal, if they are

registered by their real parents and whether or not they live in a risk situation, the

which facilitates the practice, among us, of the sale of children (cfr. News published in the Journal

Express from April 9, 2005 pages. 18-19cfr. and Draft Law No 218 /IX-

Criminalization of the sale of children).

With the present proposal, it is intended, on the one hand, to make binding the central objective

of the project "Birth Citizen", starting from already developing the conditions for the

actuation of the Single-Citizen Card, and on the other, to comply with the Recommendation of the

Ombudsman's Office of Justice, at para. 28 /B/99, making the statement of the statement mandatory

hospital establishment attesting to the birth there occurred, for the purposes of the respective

civil registration and consecration " in all situations without exception, the compulsion of the

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establishments where the parts have occurred, communicate those births to the

civil registration . "

The present Draft Law arises, thus, in the wake of the " consideration of motherhood

as a natural fact whose legal recognition does not require an attitude of the will of the

mother ", and whose principle is underlying " to the organization of an officious procedure of

finding of the affiliation links " and which constitutes " enough demonstration of the

aspirations of the truth, from the principle of biological truth in the setting of the son states "

(Cit. Oliveira, William of, "On the Truth and Fiction in the Right of the Family" in Themes

of Family Law, p. 12).

It is yet to be used to update the value of the fine due to the default of the

obligation to affidavit, so that the counterordinance takes a deterrent effect and reflects

the importance of the standard, created as a response to the needs of society, and whose

default is underlying the illicit.

Thus, considering that in Portugal the legal regime of the birth register:

(i) It does not suit the ultimate end that is continuing-ensuring the right to identity and the

legal certainty of natural persons-, making it possible for children and young people, whose

birth was to be registered, are victims of a process of exclusion;

(ii) It is not tariff on the principles of simplification and de-bureaucratization, by requiring the

displacement of the declarant to the respective competent conservatory, by not making use of the

means made available by modern technologies,

the undersigned Deputies of the Parliamentary Group of the Socialist Party, by way of

to achieve solutions that are more appropriate to social reality and which guarantee to all citizens,

from the time of birth, the effective right to primary health care and to the

social protection and allow the purpose of the end of the civil register to be completed, they present the following

draft law:

Article 1.

(Changes to the Code of the Civil Register)

Articles 96, 102 and 295 of the Code of Civil Register, approved by the Decree-Law n.

131/95, of June 6, as amended by Decree-Law No. 36/97 of January 31 by the Decree-

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Law No. 228/2001, of August 20, and by the Decree-Law No. 113/2002 of April 20 passes

to be replaced by the following:

Article 96.

(Deadline and place)

1. The declaration of birth occurring in public or private health unit is

formalized in the terms of the following and submitted articles, with copy of the documents of

identification of progenitors, by the services of the health unit, within five

days from the date of birth, to the conservatory of the competent civil registry.

2. The birth occurred in Portuguese territory outside of public health unit or

private should be declared verbally, within the 20 immediate days, in any

conservatory of the civil registry, without prejudice to the provisions of Article 101.

Article 102.

Special requirements

1. (...)

a) (...)

b) (...)

c) the date of the birth, including, if possible, the exact time, in compliance, if it is

case of this, with the document issued, by the health unit where the

birth, and signed by the doctor who has attended the birth or who can substantiate it;

d) (...)

e) (...)

f) (...)

2. (...)

3. (...)

4. (...)

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Article 295.

(Omission of the declaration of birth or death)

1. The persons who, being obliged to declare or refer to the conservatory of the civil registry the

birth or death of any person, do not do so within the legal deadline are punished

with the fine of 150 € at 400 €.

2. (...)

3. (...)

4. (...)

Article 2.

(Additions to the Code of Civil Register)

They are deferred to the Code of Civil Register Articles 96-A, 96-B and 96 -C, with the following

wording:

Article 96-The

(Written statement of the birth)

1. For the purposes of the provisions of paragraph 1 of the preceding article the progenitors declare, in the twenties and

four hours after the birth, this fact in the health unit itself, in print of

legal model, to be approved by joint order of the Ministers of Labour and of the

Social Security, Justice and Health.

2. The declaration is listed in the elements stated in Article 102 (1) as well as the

mention for indication of the competent conservatory, in accordance with Article 101, for

where the declaration is to be sent.

3. The declaration shall be formalized, and signed by any of the progenitors or by

person indicated in the al. b) of paragraph 1 of Article 97, with mention of the number, date and

entity issuer of the identity card, of equivalent document issued by

authority of one of the countries of the European Union or of the passport.

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Article 96-B

(Statement officiated by the Health Unit)

1. Where the parent does not give compliance to the established in the articles

previous, it is up to the health unit, where the birth occurs, to declare the fact, of

agreement with the printed model approved by joint order of the Ministers of the

Labour and Social Security, Justice and Health, to the Conservatory of the respective

area that will wash the seat of birth.

2. Of the declaration are listed, where possible, the name of the mother, with mention of the number,

date and entity issuer of the respective identity card, passport or document

equivalent issued by authority of one of the countries of the European Union and the elements

constants of the lineas b) to d) of paragraph 1 of Article 102.

3. The name of the registrant is chosen in the terms of Articles 103 and 108, the surname being the

of the mother.

4. Whenever it is not possible to determine the identity of the progenitors, or the conservative

have doubts as to its truthfulness is washed the abandoned seat on the terms of the

article 107.

96.-C

(Effects of registration)

1. Washable the registration of birth, declared in the terms of the preceding Articles, shall be

past the respective birth bulletin and sent by the conservatory to the

residence of those whose maternity and paternity consider themselves to be established.

2. When the declaration of birth suffers from some deficiency or irregularity,

should the conservative carry out the necessary representations in order for the birth to be

directly stated in the conservatory of the civil registry.

3. In the cases provided for in the preceding article, shall the conservative, in such a way as to ensure that the

seat of birth contains all the elements indicated in Article 102, send, in the

period of eight days from the receipt of the respective declaration of birth, letter

simple for the mother's residence, setting an eight-day deadline to proceed to the

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change of the name or surname of the registrant and indicate the constant elements of the art.

102.

4. Passed the deadline specified in the preceding paragraph, without any of the parent having

proceeded to the indication of the elements provided for in the preceding paragraph, the registration of

birth being a copy of the seat sent, for the purposes of Article 113 (2) and

of Article 119 (2), for the residence of the mother and husband of the mother and for the Commission

National of Protection of Children and Young People at Risk.

Article 3.

The Decree-Law No. 13/2001 of January 25 is repealed.

Assembly of the Republic, May 20, 2005

The Deputies