ACT Consumer Affairs Minister Shane Rattenbury tabled draft laws on Thursday that would give parents the option to register the birth of their stillborn child in a wider range of circumstances.

Mr Rattenbury said the bill was an acknowledgement that a birth certificate provided an "an important recognition of the life lost".

"The death of an unborn child under any circumstance is traumatic, and this grief can be compounded by the requirements of a registration system that may be experienced as arbitrary and insensitive," Mr Rattenbury said

"For some parents in this situation, the requirement to give their child a name and to register a birth can compound their trauma, whereas for others it might provide important recognition, and they may experience further distress if not able to register their child."

As it stands, parents are required to register the birth of a stillborn child if it was born during or after 20 weeks' gestation.

However there is no option to formally recognise children who die in utero before 20 weeks' gestation, but are born after 20 weeks.

The birth of a child before 20 weeks' gestation is not legally considered a stillbirth, but rather a miscarriage.

However, not all children who die in utero are born immediately after their heartbeat stops.

When there is a gap in time, practices are inconsistent across the ACT.

Some medical staff state the time when the child showed no sign of a heartbeat on the birth notification statement, which is provided to Access Canberra, while others do not.

If a statement indicates a child showed no sign of a heartbeat before 20 weeks' gestation, the child cannot be registered.

If this is not indicated, and the child is born after 20 weeks' gestation, the parents must register the birth.

Under the changes, parents would have the option to register their child's birth if their heart stopped beating before 20 weeks' gestation, but was born after that time.

The bill would also allow parents to choose whether to include a stillborn child as part of a multiple birth registration and on the birth certificate of children born later.

Red Nose’s chief health adviser Jane Wiggill said the laws, if passed, would help parents come to terms with the loss of their child.

“Red Nose fully supports legislation that gives parents the choice to register their child’s birth. Currently, this is a choice parents don’t have, and for many, the formal recognition can help with their grief journey," Ms Wiggill said.

The bill will also remove an alternative definition of a stillborn child based on body mass.

The current laws state if a fetus’s gestational age cannot be reliably established, a body mass of 400 grams or more would make the fetus legally a stillborn child.

"The Act was originally drafted at the time when gestational age could not be reliably determined," Mr Rattenbury said.

"Today’s technology can accurately determine a fetus’s gestational age, so having this alternative definition based on body mass is redundant and causes confusion."

One baby every week is stillborn at the Canberra Hospital, with up to 80 babies stillborn every year.

About half of those who have a stillborn baby never find out the cause of death.