Man who mixed sperm with his father's to get partner pregnant will not have to get paternity test, court rules

After experiencing fertility problems and being unable to afford IVF treatment, the man, known as PQ, and his then-partner, JK, agreed to mix his sperm with his father’s and inject it into the woman, the court heard at a hearing last month.

Mr Justice Poole was told that the arrangement was “always intended” to be kept secret and resulted in the birth of a now five-year-old boy, known as D.

However, after Barnsley Council was informed about the circumstances of the conception in separate proceedings, it brought a legal bid over the parentage of the child.

The council asked the High Court in Sheffield to direct DNA tests that should be carried out to determine whether the man was D’s father.

But in a judgment yesterday, Mr Justice Poole dismissed the bid, finding the council had “no stake in the outcome”.

The judge said the family had “created a welfare minefield”, adding: “I cannot believe that JK, PQ and (his father) RS properly thought through the ramifications of their scheme for JK to become pregnant, otherwise it is unlikely that they would have embarked upon it.”

He continued that the boy “is a unique child who would not exist but for the unusual arrangements made for his conception, but those arrangements have also created the potential for him to suffer emotional harm were he to learn of them”.

Mr Justice Poole said the man had an established father-and-son relationship with the child and it was up to him and the boy’s mother to “manage the latent risks to his welfare”.

Dismissing the council’s bid, the judge said the body does not have parental responsibility or a “personal interest” in the boy’s biological parentage.

He said: “It may wish to know who is D’s biological father, but it has no stake in the outcome of its application.

“A wish to uphold the public interest in maintaining accurate records of births does not confer a personal interest in the determination of such an application.”

Mr Justice Poole concluded that the family may wish to undergo a paternity test to tell the child at a later date “but that is a matter for them”.