It's My Body Isn't It - FTM Australia

Conclusion
UK jurisprudence has already shown a fissure between a child’s right to
consent to medical treatment and a child’s right to refuse medical treatment
so that clearly Gillick competent minors are having their strongly held
wishes overborne with respect to refusing medical treatment. It would be
surprising if the Family Court was not called upon to adjudicate a dispute of
this type in the foreseeable future.
To the extent that UNCROC is embodied in the Family Law Act, and
particularly as far as a child’s best interests are concerned, the determination
of cases has been made with a child-rights focus. However, the way those
rights are articulated and given effect and the priority they are accorded as
against the rights of other parties will unarguably be different if cases are
conducted within an explicit rights framework. The post Human Rights Act
litigation in the United Kingdom shows that, as least as far as consent to
medical treatment is concerned, a statutory rights based instrument makes
manifest that which can often be obscured by an open-ended ‘best interests’
inquiry. In so doing, a human rights act has enormous potential to give real
and enduring effect to young people’s right to make their own decisions
about their own bodies.
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