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Tuesday, May 09, 2006 :
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Gay couples granted limited immigration rights
GAY partnerships are now being recognised in Ireland in immigration cases where one of the partners moving here is an EU national.
The landmark move follows the signing into law of an EU directive on freedom of movement by the Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell.
The directive obliges members states to allow the non-EU partner of an EU citizen to move to the country and live there. This is in situations where the couple’s relationship has been legally recognised in the EU country from which they are coming.
The implementation of the EU Free Movement
Directive was welcomed by the Gay and Lesbian Equality Network (GLEN).
Eoin Collins of GLEN, said: “We very much welcome the signing by Minister McDowell of the directive into Irish law and I think it is very, very important that it has happened.”
“Under the terms of the directive, Ireland is obliged to facilitate the entry and residence of the partner, including the same sex partner, with whom an EU citizen has a durable relationship and it is duly attested and the department is putting in place procedures for assessing that,” he explained.
He said Ireland has to recognise the relationship only in cases where the country the couple is travelling from has registered partnership legislation.
The obligation on Ireland to enable the free movement of partners is despite the fact that Ireland currently does not recognise same-sex relationships.
“This is a very important first step towards recognising same sex couples in immigration rules,” said Mr Collins.
He said, however, that there were a number of anomalies in the directive.
“The directive only applies to people on the move, so it’s an EU citizen with a non-EU partner coming here. The directive doesn’t currently cover an Irish person living here and their non-EU partner. If the Irish person wants the partner here on the basis of their relationship there is no provision for that.”
But he said that an Irish person could bring their partner back to Ireland if both of them were moving here from an EU country with partnership rights.
Publishing the directive, the Department of Justice said the new recognition of gay partnerships in EU travel did not extend to other areas.
Both the minister and the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern have stated their intention to bring in civil recognition of same sex partnerships.
A Department of Justice spokeswoman said that a working group was currently examining civil partnerships and was due to report back in the next couple of months.
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