ECtHR: Refusal to recognise a legal relationship between a child and the biological mother’s ex-partner: no violation of Article 8 ECHR

Posted: 29 Mar 2022 04:25 AM PDT (c) Paul Johnson, http://echrso.blogspot.com/

The Fifth Section of the European Court of Human Rights has issued its judgment in C.E. and Others v France holding unanimously that there has been no violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) of the ECHR. 

The judgment concerns two cases. 

The first case relates to the rejection by the French domestic courts of an application for full adoption of a child, made by the biological mother’s former partner. 

The second case concerns the French domestic courts’ refusal to issue a document attesting to a matter of common knowledge (“acte de notoriété”) recognising a legal parent-child relationship, on the basis of de facto enjoyment of status (“possession d’état”), between a child and the biological mother’s former partner.

The judgment is only available in French, but a Press Release of the Court summarises the judgment. 

Comment: The French legislation has been changed for the future (under a 2021 law in France, the biological mother’s partner can now establish a legal (parental) relationship with the child shortly after a birth through donor insemination.