Paternity case lost but legal history made

John Young says he won't pay the $25,000 the court awarded in costs to multimillionaire John Hemmes. Picture / HAWKE'S BAY TODAY

John Young has spent $100,000 in a legal fight to prove he is the biological son of an Australian multimillionaire.

His case may even have created a legal precedent, with a Supreme Court ruling that adopted people can use a court declaration to identify their natural parents only if this is needed to establish a legal right.

But making a small piece of legal history is no consolation for the 51-year-old Napier union organiser, who claims Sydney businessman John Hemmes is his biological father through a brief affair with his mother.

Mr Hemmes has denied paternity since he was first approached 14 years ago.

Last week, the Supreme Court in Wellington overruled a Court of Appeal decision that said Mr Young could seek a formal paternity declaration under the Status of Children Act 1969.

Mr Young said he's "definitely disappointed" by the judgment, which has ended his fight for a legal declaration in his favour.

"What they're really saying is adoptees don't have a right to know who their parents are."

The Hawkes Bay man claimed his fight had never been about the Australian property magnate's money or any legal right - he simply wanted to know for sure who his natural father was so he could trace his genealogy and be able to tell his two children the name of their grandfather.

He has only the word of his late mother that she had a brief affair with Mr Hemmes in 1953.

Mr Young and his twin sister, who has since died of cancer, were born that year and adopted by their biological mother's husband in 1958.

"Ninety-nine per cent sure" that Mr Hemmes is their father, Mr Young still wanted to be "100 per cent" convinced.

A senior Auckland family lawyer, Norman Elliott, said the outcome of the case was a statutory interpretation. Under the Adoption Act 1955, once an adoption order was made, the relationship of biological parents and children ceased and a new legal relationship was created between the child and his/her adoptive parents.
Mr Elliott said the court could recommend but not order blood and DNA testing to establish paternity.

Mr Young's lawyer, Susan Hughes of New Plymouth, described the situation as "really unusual".

Her client could do nothing to prove Mr Hemmes was his natural father. Three different judges had found in favour of him seeking a declaration under the Status of Children Act.

"But we lost on the fourth round. The Supreme Court has spoken. That is the end of it."

Ms Hughes said even if the court had found in favour of her client and they had called for evidence to prove Mr Hemmes was the father, "my assumption would have been that he [Mr Hemmes] would have opposed that".

Auckland litigation lawyer Chris Browne, who represented Mr Hemmes, said the relationship issue - whether legal or biological - had never been tested before in the 35 years the Status of Children Act had been in place.

The Supreme Court has ordered Mr Young, as the respondent, to pay $25,000 in costs to the appellant, Mr Hemmes.

Mr Young said; "There's no way in the world I'm going to pay the $25,000."

He now wants to go to Parliament to annul his adoption.

Failing that he will try and get public support for a law change that "reflects society's needs."

- additional reporting: Nicholas Moody, NZPA