ext_54511 ([identity profile] patternsofchaos.livejournal.com) wrote in [personal profile] sqbr 2008-11-08 01:24 am (UTC)

Section 10 of the WA Interpretation Act (http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/wa/consol_act/ia1984191/s10.html) says
"In any written law...words denoting a gender or genders include each other gender".

This is mainly to get around the fact that a lot of laws say 'he' (for simplicity I guess. Maybe some say 'she') but are meant to apply to everyone. But it makes me wonder about the interpretation of all those laws that say 'marriage is between a man and a woman', or about IVF only being available to couples 'who are male and female'. But I expect most of them would have some provision that the definition in the Interpretation Act doesn't apply...


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