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FOREIGN VERSIONS OF THE PACS WILL SOON HAVE LEGAL FORCE IN FRANCE FOLLOWING A VOTE BY MPS. BRITISH civil partners living in France are to have their relationship status recognised in France
for the first time. While the UK government already recognises the French pacs the French government has not previously recognised foreign equivalents like the British civil partnership –
apart from as an obstacle to creating a pacs - a French civil union. British civil partners have also been unable – even if they wanted to – to separate in order to get a pacs as the British
civil partnership law requires separation or fault for dissolution. The new ruling means gay couples will no longer be treated as if they were single in France, which has had heavy
consequences in taxation and inheritance tax matters. Civil partners had been treated as ‘strangers’, suffering a 60% inheritance tax on a deceased partner’s property. Even for
non-residents, those with a holiday home in France, the 60% applied to the inherited share of the French home. For residents it applied to inherited assets worldwide. This important legal
change came as an ammendment during a debate by MPs on simplifying legal procedures. It had already been adopted by the Senate after being proposed by Greens and Socialists. The law will now
become definitive once it is published in the Journal Officiel. Lawyer Caroline Mécary, who has been fighting for the rights of British civil partners in France, said the result should be
that foreign partnerships will have the same effects in France as was intended in the country where they were formed. The law is not expected to have a retrospective effect, but should be
applicable to legal matters – such as inheritance procedures – that are currently under way, she said. One British member of a civil partnership, Ben Hepworth, who has property in Britain
and France, said the ruling would not make it possible for him to become resident in France. “The 60% inheritance tax was our greatest problem. This means that we now have a chance to live
and work in France, the 60% inheritance tax on all worldwide assets meant that we could never live there full time as no life insurance would have covered the cost of the inheritance tax
bill. “It also means we have rights: social, civil and legal and we would be legally recognised as a couple. That is what we are – we have been together for more than 20 years – we aren’t
single and we should be recognised.”