M.W. v. United Kingdom

Social security rights

(Application No. 11313/02), 5 November 2008 

Find Court’s judgement here. (Complaint rejected as manifestly ill-founded)

• The applicant complained that, as a survivor of a same-sex couple who had had no means to achieve formal recognition of their relationship, he had been denied a benefit available to a survivor of a married couple.
• ILGA-Europe, together with FIDH, ICJ and AIRE Centre, submitted the following:
  • If the European Convention does not yet require equal access to legal marriage for same-sex couples, it is indirect discrimination based on sexual orientation to limit a particular right or benefit to married different-sex couples, but provide no means for same-sex couples to qualify. There is a growing consensus in European and other democratic societies that same-sex couples must be provided with some means of qualifying for rights or benefits attached to marriage.
  • The right to equal treatment requires that the State find alternative means to allow the survivor of a same-sex couple to receive Bereavement Payment. The adoption of the Civil Partnership Act should be seen as confirming that the previous situation, in which same-sex couples had no means of achieving official recognition of their relationship, was discriminatory.