10 Following the 2016 Intersex Roundtable,
the New Zealand Government received four
intersex-specific recommendations from the UN
Committee on the Rights of the Child in their
concluding observations on the fifth periodic
report of New Zealand (page 8, Harmful Practices:
25: (b)(c)(d)(e)):
• Develop and implement a child rights-based
health care protocol for intersex children, setting
the procedures and steps to be followed by
health teams, ensuring that no one is subjected to
unnecessary medical or surgical treatment during
infancy or childhood, guaranteeing the rights of
children to bodily integrity, autonomy and selfdetermination, and provide families with intersex
children with adequate counselling and support;
• Promptly investigate incidents of surgical and
other medical treatment of intersex children
without informed consent and adopt legal
provisions to provide redress to victims of such
treatment, including adequate compensation;
• Educate and train medical and psychological
professionals on the range of biological and
physical sexual diversity and on the consequences
of unnecessary surgical and other medical
interventions on intersex children;
• Extend free access to surgical interventions
and medical treatment related to their intersex
condition to intersex children between the age
of 16 and 18.
11
The New Zealand government also received the
following request (Article 16, para. 32) by the UN
Committee Against Torture in the List of Issues
Prior to Reporting (LoIPR) in the 60th session of
the committee, 18th April – 12 May 2017:
Please comment on reports of premature surgery
and other medical treatment to which intersex
children are subjected (see the submissions
of Intersex Trust Aotearoa New Zealand, and
StopIGM.org and Zwischengeschlecht.org to
the Committee against Torture in 2017). Please
indicate the number of intersex children who
have undergone sex assignment surgery during
the reporting period.
Intersex Roundtable Report 2017
The 2017 Intersex Roundtable
12 The 2017 Roundtable took place on 21 June 2017
in Wellington.
13 Building on the 2016 Intersex Roundtable, the
recommendations of the UN Committee on the
Rights of the Child and the request from the UN
Committee Against Torture, the objectives for the
2017 Roundtable were to:
• Update on progress since the 2016
Roundtable
• Identify issues and strategies toward
improving the quality of life for intersex
people – children and family/whānau
• Build understanding and awareness of
intersex issues
14 A variety of updates were presented by
stakeholders on the progress made on intersex
issues in the last 12 months, as detailed in
Appendix 2. Presentations covered the fields of
human rights, nursing, pediatric endocrinology,
whānau advocacy, midwifery, medical education
and legislative updates from parliament.
15 Participants shared copies of new publications
and position statements with the group prior to
the event and these have been compiled in
Appendix 3.
Roundtable Outcomes
16 The following key themes emerged from the
presentations and discussions at the 2017
Roundtable:
Bodily integrity
• The protection of, and advocacy for, bodily
autonomy of intersex persons must remain
central to discussions of ending the practice of
genital normalisation on intersex children in
Aotearoa New Zealand.
3