Italy’s Parliament has passed a bill legalising civil unions for same-sex couples.
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Rome: Italy is set to legalise gay civil unions with a confidence vote in parliament Wednesday on a bill hailed as a historic turning point but criticised as a missed opportunity for greater change.
Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi won the vote by 369 votes to 193, with two abstentions.
Final approval of civil unions is expected later on Wednesday, but that vote by MPs is seen as a formality, as the confidence vote was the crucial hurdle.
A section, which required the need for faithfulness and fidelity in a civil union, was removed due to fears that requiring a gay couple to not cheat would be “too similar to marriage”.
The final version gives gay couples the right to share a surname, draw on their partner’s pension when they die, and inherit each other’s assets in the same way as married people.
Other Italians took to Twitter to celebrate, many using the rainbow emoji to show their support for gay rights.
Italy has become the latest country to back same-sex civil unions.
Renzi called today “a day of celebration” on his Twitter account ahead of the vote.
Family judges will instead decide on a case-by-case basis. “The glass is half full”, Gabriele Piazzoni, national secretary of the Arcigay organisation, said in a statement. The failure of the bill was cited as one of the causes behind the fall of his government in 2008.
Italy has long faced calls from its own constitutional court and the European Court of Human Rights to make the move, but all past reform proposals have been derailed by the Vatican and conservative politicians.
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Italy has been under pressure from the European Court of Human Rights which a year ago said the country had violated human rights by not offering enough legal protection for same-sex partnerships.
