hunter of justice

German registered partners entitled to same pension rights as spouses

Germany's constitutional court (the equivalent to the U.S. Supreme Court) ruled late last week that surviving partners in a registered civil partnership have a right to collect under the occupational pension scheme for civil service employees. The court found that affording such payments to surviving spouses in a marriage but excluding civil partners violated the equal treatment provision in Article 3.1 of Germany's Basic Law (the rough equivalent of the Constitution), and was not  justified by the rationale underlying the pension system. The complaint was brought by a civil servant in a registered partnership after being denied the same premium rates as married persons - a classification that also would deny his partner the right to collect on the pension in the event of his death. 

Coincidentally, the Williams Institute has just published an analysis of the discrepancies between same-sex partners and married couples in their access to employer-sponsored retirement benefits in the U.S.

An English language version of the German court's summary of the new decision is after the jump -->

HUD announces new regs to end public housing discrimination against gay families; UPDATED - news from HHS also

The Department of Housing and Urban Development announced today that it will promulgate proposed regulations (presumably soon) to end discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity in its housing programs, including by specifying that gay partners fall within the agency's definition of "family" for purposes of eligibility for public housing.

The proposed reg will:

• clarify that the term "family" as used to describe eligible beneficiaries of HUD public housing and Housing Choice Voucher programs include otherwise eligible lesbian, gay, bi-sexual or transgender (LGBT) individuals and couples. The Department's intent to propose new regulations will clarify family status to ensure its subsidized housing programs are available to all families, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.
  
  
• require grantees and those who participate in the Department's programs to comply with local and state non-discrimination laws that cover sexual orientation or gender identity; and
  
  
• specify that any FHA-insured mortgage loan must be based on the credit-worthiness of a borrower and not on unrelated factors or characteristics such as sexual orientation or gender identity.

Like all proposed regs, this one will be published in the Federal Register and subject to public comment and possible revision before its final adoption. According to HUD, three million families participate in the public housing and voucher programs.

In addition, HUD will commission the first-ever national study of discrimination against LGBT persons in the rental and sale of housing.

This is exactly the kind of progressive regulatory step that the Administration should be taking. My hope is that, now that most departments have at least most of their political appointees in place, we will see similar moves from across the Executive Branch. Recall that the memorandum signed by the President in June gave departments 90 days to report back to OPM on ways to eliminate discrimination against gay or trans federal employees.  Well, those 90 days were up about a month ago.  So, also on the employment front, I hope that we start seeing additional reforms from many of the federal agencies.

UPDATE: HHS also had an announcement today: it will fund the creation of a national resource center on the problems of lgbt elders that will provide information and assistance to community service programs serving the elderly.

Excerpts from the HUD and HHS press releases after the jump -->