Petra De Sutter

Petra De Sutter
Member of the Belgian Senate
Incumbent
Assumed office June 2014
Personal details
Born	10 June 1963 (1963-06-10) (age 55) Oudenaarde, Belgium
Nationality	Belgian
Political party	Green
Website	www.petradesutter.be

Petra De Sutter (Oudenaarde, 10 June 1963) is a professor of gynaecology at Ghent University, head of the Department of Reproductive Medicine at Ghent University Hospital (UZ Gent) and a politician of the Green party.

In the 2014 European elections, she was second on the list for the Flemish Green party. However, while the party gained votes, it missed its hold on an additional second seat. She was subsequently co-opted by her party for a seat in the Belgian Senate, making her one of the few openly transgender politicians in Europe.

In addition to her role in the Senate, De Sutter has been serving as member of the Belgian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe since 2014. As member of the Socialists, Democrats and Greens Group, she is currently a member of the Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons; the Committee on Rules of Procedure, Immunities and Institutional Affairs; the Sub-Committee on Integration; the Sub-Committee on Public Health and Sustainable Development; and the Sub-Committee on Ethics. She has served as the Assembly’s rapporteur on children’s rights in relation to surrogacy arrangements (2016);^[1] on the use of new genetic technologies in human beings (2017);^[2] and on the conditions of reception of refugees and migrants (2018).^[3]

Since her political debut, De Sutter has tackled important issues: a regulation for surrogacy – at a Belgian and European level –, independent clinical research in the pharmaceutical industry, the risks of TTIP for our consumer’s protection of food and chemicals, and more human rights for LGBT.

On 15 September 2018 it was announced she is seeking nomination as one of the European Greens two lead candidates for the 2019 European Parliament elections^[4].

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