Family Law

The House of Lords has held that a 'marriage' between a man and a male-to-female transsexual person is not valid, while declaring that position incompatible with the Human Rights Act 1998. This article argues that the decision was reached via two inconsistent and unconvincing strands of reasoning, and that there was a failure to reflect the tenor and spirit of the European Court of Human Rights' decision in Goodwin v United Kingdom.