Germany: Justice will be able to account unfaithful mothers – The Point

The German court will be able to ask mothers to reveal the name of their lover when their spouse deny his paternity, according to a bill approved Wednesday by the Cabinet. The challenge presented by the government as a matter of “legal security” is to enable the “fake father” to claim from the biological father, the cost of raising a child born of an extramarital relationship.

such a possibility “deeply encroaches on human rights,” lamented Katja Keul, legal expert in the German Greens, while the text has elicited no debate within the coalition between conservatives and social- Democrats in power.

Reimbursement of expenses incurred for the child

the future Article 1607 of the civil Code “to force” the mother in communicating “the third party who has insured as a father of the child subsistence “the name of his or her lovers” during the period of conception. ” The goal is to then return toward the biological father to demand of him the reimbursement of expenses incurred for the child, for a limited period to two years.

But the text submitted to Parliament provides an exception if the revelation of the biological father turns “intolerable for the mother” – a situation that the courts will be assessed case by case. Among the examples cited by the explanatory memorandum included children from incest, rape by a relative, or where the spouse had decided to take his paternity even in the knowledge that fictitious.

“Children cuckoo”

the bill does not provide for punishment if the mother refuses to answer, leaving this to the courts. The Explanatory Memorandum provides for one example the ability to compel the mother to compensate the “fake father”, “prejudiced in their financial interest.”

In the beginning of the text of a decision Constitutional Court, issued February 24, 2015, which estimated that requiring a woman the name of her lover went beyond the role of courts. The Karlsruhe court did not rule that possibility completely, but stated that legislation was needed to reconcile “the right to use” the deceived spouse and the right of the mother “to respect for his private life”.

No formal evaluation exists on the number of illegitimate children, called “cuckoo-children” ( “Kuckuckskindern”) in German. The female cuckoo traditionally lays its eggs in the nests of other species. According to studies on the subject, estimates range from 4 to 10% of births.