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European Court mandates pension benefits to "gay" couples

The highest court in the European Union has ruled that insurance companies may not retain the traditional definition of natural marriage and must recognise same-sex unions as equivalent to marriage in granting spousal pensions, reports Hilary White, LifeSiteNews.com. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg has ruled in favour of German homosexual, Tadao Maruko, who complained that an insurer had rejected his claim to €6,400 (Cn. $10,220.00) of his dead civil partner's pension.

In Germany, gay and lesbian couples can legally register their partnerings and have health insurance, inheritance and limited adoption rights but not the tax advantages. The ECJ said that refusal to grant a survivor's pension to registered homosexual partners constitutes direct discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation.

Tadao Maruko sued the insurance company Versorgungswerk der deutschen Bühnen and the Bavarian Administrative Court Munich referred the case to the ECJ. The company maintained that such pension survivor benefits were only to be granted to married spouses.

The ruling follows a trend in European legislation and court decisions that uphold the concept that there should be no legal distinction made between homosexual liaisons and natural marriages.

Defenders of the natural family have said that the changes in law throughout countries of the formerly Christian west have come as a series of dominoes that have fallen as a natural logical result of the nearly universal liberalisation of divorce and abortion laws in the west since the 1960's and 70's.

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[04/02/2008]

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