Civil Partnership and Certain Rights and Obligations of Cohabitants Act 2010

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The Civil Partnership and Certain Rights and Obligations of Cohabitants Act 2010 is an Act of the Oireachtas (Irish Parliament) which allows same-sex couples to enter into civil partnerships. The Act also provides rights for participants in long-term cohabiting relationships who have not entered into a civil partnership or marriage. There is no difference, under the Act, in the rights and obligations accorded to opposite-sex cohabiting couples or same-sex cohabiting couples; however, there are significant differences between the rights and obligations accorded to civil partners (same-sex) and those accorded to married couples (opposite-sex). The Act marks the penultimate legal step towards the recognition of same-sex partnerships; following the Marriage Act 2015, same-sex partners had access to marriage on the same basis as opposite-sex partners, with civil partnership no longer available.

It had been expected that the first civil partnership ceremony under the law would take place in April 2011 due to the need for further legislation to update Ireland's tax code and social welfare laws, and the legal requirement to give three months notice. However, the legislation does provide a mechanism for exemptions to be sought through the courts, and the first partnership between two men was registered on 7 February 2011.^[1] As required by the legislation, and contrary to some subsequent press coverage,^[2] the ceremony took place in public at the Civil Registration Office in Dublin. It was not until 5 April 2011, with the registration of a partnership between Hugh Walsh and Barry Dignam, that the media covered a partnership ceremony for the first time in detail.^[3]