The unwanted child

Abstract

When the news came forth from Downing Street last November that a fourth child was to be born to the premier and his wife, joy spread throughout the land. Gloom and despondency, by contrast, reigned in the McFarlane household when it transpired that Mrs. McFarlane was pregnant yet again, for in order to ensure that there would be no fifth child the couple had come to a decision: rather than rely on the physics of the condom or the chemistry of the pill the husband, like 9,000 other Scotsmen every year, was to resort to the surgery of vasectomy. So he did, and the health authority reported that the operation had been successful, but vital nature had counteracted medical art … and Catherine was born. She was in perfect health. Mrs. McFarlane claimed £10,000 for the pain of pregnancy and childbirth and both parents claimed £100,000 for the cost of keeping Catherine. They thereby joined the long line of those who, relying on the Court of Appeal's judgment in Emeh v. Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster A.H.A. [1985] Q.B. 1012, sought to throw on to the medical profession the cost of bringing up the child they had engendered and conceived, healthy though it was and in the event welcome—except for the expense. © 2000, Cambridge University Press. All rights reserved.