ARTICLE 8 - RIGHT TO RESPECT FOR PRIVATE AND FAMILY LIFE
(1) Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.
(2) There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
MALONE V UK, 1984.
During M’s criminal trial it came to light that the police had tapped his telephone. After he had exhausted all his remedies under English Law, he complained to the Commission, which upheld his complaint, that there had been a breach of Article 8.
The Commission expressed an opinion on the meaning of a ‘family’ in case concerning a transsexual, X, Y AND Z V UK, 1995.
The Commission reported that the UK’s failure to recognise a female to male transsexual as the father of a child born to his partner as a result of artificial insemination by a donor, was a violation of the applicants’ right to family life under Article 8. The case had arisen because the Registrar-General had refused to register the applicant transsexual as the child’s father on the birth certificate, on the basis that only a biological man could be regarded as the child’s father for the purposes of registration and that it was a criminal offence to give false information to a registrar under the Perjury Act, l911.
The Court unanimously held that the ties of X, Y and Z were such as to constitute a family, but that there were “complex scientific, legal, moral and social issues in which there was no generally shared approach among contracting states” surrounding transsexuality. The Court held (14 to 6) that Article 8 could not be read so as to recognise as the father a person who was not the biological father
HATTON V UK, 2001.
The increase in the level of noise caused by aircraft using Heathrow at night since 1993 was a breach of the applicant’s rights to respect for their private and family lives and their homes as guaranteed by Article 8.
In a recent case, the Privy Council held that a ban on the consumption of alcohol imposed for reasons of physical and mental health as a condition of a doctor’s continued right to practice, was not a breach of Article 8 (1) WHITEFIELD V GENERAL MEDICAL COUNCIL, 2002.
