European Court of Human Rights

FOURTH SECTION

FINAL DECISION

AS TO THE ADMISSIBILITY OF

Application no. 68264/01
by Arthur POWNEY
against the United Kingdom

The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting on 13 May 2008 as a Chamber composed of:

Lech Garlicki, President,
Nicolas Bratza,
Giovanni Bonello,
Ljiljana Mijović,
David Thór Björgvinsson,
Ledi Bianku,
Mihai Poalelungi, judges,
and Lawrence Early, Section Registrar,

Having regard to the above application lodged on 27 February 2001,

Having regard to the decision to apply Article 29 § 3 of the Convention and examine the admissibility and merits of the case together,

Having regard to the partial decision of 10 September 2002, to communicate this application and to join it to other applications (nos. 58372/00, 61878/00, 63477/00, 63480/00, 63647/00, 63961/00, 64986/01, 64996/01, 65202/01, 65478/01, 65507/01, 65741/01, 65906/01, 66181/01, 67100/01, 67913/01, 68173/01, 68175/01, 68298/01, 68449/01, 69076/01, 69323/01, 69327/01, 69491/01, 70521/01, 70741/01, 71176/01, 71428/01, 71429/01, 71570/01, 71758/01, 72656/01, 73646/01, 73653/01, 73978/01, 74961/01, 75092/01, 75126/01, 75993/01, 75995/01, 77129/01, 77424/01, 682/02, 2573/02, 4810/02, 10747/02, 13944/02, 14404/02 and 14537/02),

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

THE FACTS

The applicant, Mr Arthur Powney, is a British national who was born in 1938 and lives in Wigan. He was unrepresented before the Court. The United Kingdom Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent, Mr C. Whomersley of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

A.  The circumstances of the case

The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.

The applicant’s wife died on 24 May 1991. On 27 November 2000 the applicant applied for widows’ benefits. On 30 November 2000 the applicant was informed that his claim had been disallowed. On 12 December 2000 the applicant asked for reconsideration. The matter was reconsidered and the decision remained unchanged.

The applicant did not appeal further as he considered or was advised that such a remedy would be bound to fail since no such social security benefit was payable to widowers under United Kingdom law.

B.  Relevant domestic law

The domestic law relevant to this application is set out in Willis v. the United Kingdom, no. 36042/97, §§ 14 26, ECHR 2002-IV and Runkee and White v. the United Kingdom, no. 42949/98, §§ 40-41, 25 July 2007.

COMPLAINT

The applicant complained that British social security legislation discriminated against him on grounds of sex, in breach of Article 14 of the Convention taken in conjunction with both Article 8 of the Convention and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1.

THE LAW

On 27 August 2007 the Registry of the Court sent the applicant a letter requesting him to inform the Court about whether a friendly settlement of the case had been agreed or, alternatively, to submit his claims for just satisfaction by 27 November 2007. The applicant did not reply. On 14 December 2007 the Registry of the Court sent another letter by registered mail requesting the applicant to forward any comments by 2 January 2008 and warning him that failure to do so might lead the Court to strike the case out of its list. Again the applicant did not reply. On 17 March 2008 the Registry of the Court sent the applicant another letter by registered mail stating that since he had not made contact, the Court would consider striking his application out of the list for lack of interest. The applicant has not contacted the Court since.

In the light of the above, in accordance with Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention, the Court considers that the applicant does not intend to pursue his application. Furthermore, the Court finds no special circumstances regarding respect for human rights as defined in the Convention or its Protocols which require the continuation of the examination of the application.

In view of the above, it is appropriate to discontinue the application of Article 29 § 3 and to strike the remainder of the application out of the list of cases.

For these reasons, the Court unanimously

Decides to disjoin the application from the others to which it was joined;

Decides to strike the remainder of the application out of its list of cases.

Lawrence Early Lech Garlicki
Registrar President