Family rights of unmarried father violated in German courts

European Court of Human Rights

Zaunegger -v- Germany. 

Judgment was delivered on December 3rd, 2009.

Judgment 

The court found a violation of Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) and of Article 8 (right to respect for family life) in the case of a father who was denied a judicial review of a court decision that he could not obtain a joint custody order without the consent of the mother.

B -v- O’R High Court Judgment was given by Mr Justice Roderick Murphy on May 15th, 2009
Judgment

An unmarried father of three children failed in his attempt to prevent the children’s mother moving to Britain with the children, when he appealed a decision of the Circuit Court to allow the move.

Background
 

Unmarried fathers should have guardianship rights to their children, the Law Reform Commission has said.

Twenty-seven years after a similar overhaul of family law was first proposed, the influential body has called for legal parental responsibility to be extended to men.

The commission proposed a raft of reforms allowing fathers day-to-day care and contact with their children, bringing Ireland into line with most of Europe.

German child custody laws discriminate against single fathers and should be changed, the European Court of Human Rights ruled on Thursday. 

The six to one decision was in favour of a 45-year-old father from Cologne. He has has been trying to gain custody of his 14-year-old daughter for eight years after a state court denied him dual custody in 2003.

AN UNMARRIED father has won a High Court order overturning the adoption without his knowledge of his eight-year-old daughter by his former partner’s husband.

Unmarried fathers should have guardianship rights to their children, the Law Reform Commission said today.

Some 27 years after a similar overhaul of family law was first proposed, the commission has called for legal parental responsibility to be extended to men.