Two years ago, the life of Pink (not her real name to maintain her anonymity) changed when she lost the man who has been her partner for almost 25 years, the father of her daughter and, for her, her “husband” in every sense, except in legal terms. He was admitted to the hospital at the age of 58 due to a internal bleeding and, after a month of fighting, the doctors told him that there was no longer hope. Since then, Rosa has not been able to face her grief in peace; Instead, it has been mired in a seemingly endless bureaucratic battle.
Despite the years of shared life, The law denies her a widow’s pension as they have not been formally married or registered as a de facto couple.. Rosa continues fighting to receive a pension that she considers fair, while trying to support her daughter and face a pain that hasn’t had time to process yet.
narrates to Public that has presented two certificates of cohabitation and wills mutual where the notary certifies your cohabitation as a couple. She regrets that, despite the years her husband has contributed to her taxes, Now she feels helpless: “Not having a registered partnership does not mean that our relationship has been less stable,” she emphasizes.
Since the death of her husband, Rosa asks herself every day: “What can I do so that my daughter does not lack anything and feels the absence of her father as little as possible?” “If I have to deprive myself of something, I will do it, but don’t let her notice it,” he says. He is worried about the future. Her daughter was only seven years old when her father died and, with tears in her eyes, Rosa remembers asking herself then: “And now what awaits me? My daughter is very young, and I have many years ahead of me to raise her alone“.
She considers it unfair that, despite the intention of the widow’s pension to offer stability and security to those who lose their partner, in their case they find themselves helpless and without any financial support. “Why should my daughter change her standard of living for lack of a role?” she asks. “It’s not just a bureaucratic procedure, we’re talking about people“he laments.
Rosa: “I could present witnesses, mortgage documents and shared accounts, but all that doesn’t seem to matter”
He insists that he could present witnesses, mortgage documents and shared accounts that prove their life together, but all that doesn’t seem to matter. “For them, one of the requirements is that, and they save paying me“, he criticizes. He explains that the judge responded to his lawyer that official registration as a de facto couple is mandatory because “there are many scams.” Rosa regrets the lack of empathy in this regulation: “They don’t realize what’s ahead of them.”
Today, he is still waiting to hear the sentence after filing an appeal. Furthermore, she confesses that, since her husband’s death, she has not had time to process her grief. “Since he passed away, I’ve been stuck in paperwork. and, many times, I think: I can’t grieve because I have no rest,” he says. If the appeal is rejected, he assumes that he will be left without the right to a widow’s pension and He will have to face the future with the salary he receives working reduced hours to take care of her daughter, a schedule she cannot change.
The same thing happened to Esther. The couple with whom he had shared 27 years of his life and with whom he had two children, died in an accident. Five months earlier, they had begun to process their civil marriage. “However, The Administration rejected my request for a widow’s pension for not being registered as a de facto couple,” she comments.
Esther and her partner had never considered the option of getting married. “Afterwards we started living together, we didn’t feel the need to do it either,” he says. “However, during a check-up they detected a small spot on his liver and that worried him a lot. That’s when We decided to start the process to get married in the Civil Registry of Madridin order to formalize our relationship before the law. But we never became that,” he laments.
He gathered all the documentation that proved their coexistence for almost three decades: “However, the registration certificate that corroborated it, the joint bank account opened in 1991, the reciprocal wills, nor the shared ownership of our assets, were of no use. The Management General of Personnel Costs and Public Pensions ignored everything,” he concludes.
A campaign with almost 100,000 signatures
Almost 100,000 people share the opinion of Rosa and Esther, as reflected in a campaign on Change.org promoted by the Widows Equality Association (AVI). “What we ask for is a modification of the article 221.2 of Social Securitywhich currently requires registration,” he explains to Public Asia Selmaspokesperson for the association. “There are different options, such as family law, but The draft of this regulation does not recognize us as a family model either.. For this reason, we are holding meetings with political parties and parliamentary groups so that they recognize all unregistered families as a valid form of coexistence,” he adds. In addition, Selma mentions the existence of a royal decree, 2/2024, approved on May 21, 2024which is based on a provision of the European Unionwith the aim of promote gender equality and facilitate work-life balance.
“The Spanish government assures that, with this decree aimed at promoting conciliation and gender equality, the concept of de facto couples will be modified so that more people can access the minimum vital income and unemployment benefit, thus eliminating the requirement of registry for those families of common-law couples with children in common,” he explains. “However, in the case of widow’s benefits, we understand that it is a time of great vulnerability, and, Despite everything, they continue to demand that registration“he laments.
“This right was recognized before 2014”
Selma explains that, before 2014, there was the right to receive a widow’s pension without having to be registered as a de facto couple or married. “Until then, unmarried and unregistered couples, in the event of the death of one of the members, could go to court and prove your relationship through other legally accepted meanssuch as the registry, the existence of children in common, testimonies or a joint mortgage,” he points out. “This allowed them to be recognized as a couple and, from there, access the widow’s pension,” he says.
“We live in a theoretically democratic society, where there are various family models and we are all supposed to have the right to choose ours, or at least that’s what they tell us,” he says. However, he points out that, In practice, this right is limited. He explains that, in 2014, a ruling by the Constitutional Court, which sought to regulate access to the widow’s pension and advance rights, In reality “it was a setback”. Since then, says the association’s spokesperson, “all couples without that signature are unprotected.”
Àsia Selma: “90% of widows are women. A gender perspective must be included in the widow’s pension”
Selma points out that marriage, historically, is a patriarchal figure established to define property recognition and gender roles, where the woman stayed at home and the man was the provider. “We are returning to that model“, he warns. Furthermore, he emphasizes that 90% of widows are womenwhich is why it is considered essential include a gender perspective in widowhood benefits. “We, in many cases, come from a gender gap; when we have children in common, we often reduce our working hours or ask for leaves of absence,” she explains, highlighting the economic inequality that many women face after the loss of their partner.
The TSJIB questions the constitutionality of the pension
In November 2023, the Superior Court of Justice of the Balearic Islands (TSJIB), made up of Joan Agustí Maragall, Antoni Oliver Reus (president) and Alejandro Roa Nonideasked the Constitutional Court to rule on the possible unconstitutionality of article 221.2 of the Royal Decree. Legislative 8/2015, of October 30, which approves the refunded text of the General Law of Social Security. This article regulates the widow’s pension for de facto couples, and the TSJIB suggests that it could violate the right to equality established in article 14 of the Constitution.
Specifically, the magistrates raised the doubt about whether the second paragraph of the aforementioned article 221.2 could be incompatible with the article 14 of the Constitutionwhich guarantees equality before the law and prohibits discrimination based on sex, as well as with articles 39 and 41which refer to the social, economic and legal protection of the family and protection against situations of need. However, in October of this year, the plenary session of the Constitutional decided not to admit this question of unconstitutionality to processing.
Regarding this, the AVI spokesperson insists that by denying the widow’s pension to those who are not registered as de facto or married couples, Yes, these articles of the Spanish Constitution are being violated. Also highlights the article 24which talks about judicial protection, “since to demonstrate your family model, it should not be necessary to use a single means, but rather various means.” “We ask that this right that we previously had be returned to us, from a democratic and philosophical perspective. What is a family? Is it a family that signs a paper or one that is built?“he questions.
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