Communicated on 4 March 2020
Published on 23 March 2020
FOURTH SECTION
Applications nos. 66078/17 and 12918/19
Éva Margit CSIKÓS and Others against Hungary
and Péter GABELICS and Others against Hungary
lodged on 1 September 2017 and 20 February 2019 respectively
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The applications concern administrative proceedings in which the applicants, who are Hungarian transgender persons, sought to have the sex/gender marker and their name on the birth certificate changed.
Between 2017 and 2019, the applicants – pursuant to the legislation in force at the material time – applied to the Budapest Government Office (Budapest Főváros Kormányhivatala) to have the legal status of name and gender changed. According to the relevant provisions, the Ministry of Human Resources was supposed to carry out an assessment whether the diagnosis of transsexuality had been well-substantiated based on the attached medical documents and to issue a legal opinion on the matter.
However, following the entering into force of Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 (GDPR), the Ministry held that there was no legal basis for processing or storing the sensitive personal data of the applicants and therefore returned the documents to the Office without issuing any legal opinion. The Office informed the applicants that the proceedings were suspended until the adoption of the new rules in compliance with the EU Regulation.
As it appears from the case-file the applicants have not received a final decision on the recognition of their gender yet.
The applicants complain under Article 8 of the Convention about the absence of statutory provisions regulating the procedure for recognition of their gender identities and about the lack of a decision on the merits.
QUESTION TO THE PARTIES
Has there been a violation of Article 8 of the Convention in view of the alleged absence of any law regulating the conditions and procedure for registering the new identity of a transsexual (see case X v. the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, no. 29683/16, §§ 63-71, 17 January 2019)?
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