The government of the Italian far-right Giorgia Meloni, whose vice president is Matteo Salvini, wants to limit the rights of homosexual families with children. The last step has been taken by Prosecutor’s Office of the Italian city of Paduawhat has contested registration in the City Hall of the children of 33 couples lesbians.

Children who were born even more than five years ago and for whom the Prosecutor’s Office wants to modify their registration: that they appear only as children of the biological parent, instead of the names of the two mothers.

The environment in which these families find themselves is a real limbo. On one hand, the gay marriage is not legal in Italy. The civil union of same-sex couples is recognized, but they do not have the same rights. In addition, it is artificial insemination for lesbian couples prohibitedso when they want to have children they resort to these techniques abroad.

The mayor of the city, Sergio Giordani (of the Democratic Party), registers the children of homosexual couples in the Civil Registry of the City Council, taking advantage of the legal vacuum. “Since 2017 I register the birth certificates of girls and boys sons of two mothers. It is a act of responsibility towards the little ones because I do not accept that they are discriminated“. Giordani speaks of a “very serious legal vacuum that Parliament should legislate”.

And in this context, the Padua Prosecutor’s Office has already sent a notification to some families to go to court and clarify their situation, with the ultimate goal of canceling the name of the non-biological parent in the data of the children of both.

From associations that fight for collective rights, such as ‘Arcobaleno Family’ (Rainbow Families), denounce that this challenge comes as a result of the policies of the extreme right in the Government. “We are talking about taking away a legal father minors even six years after birth: a shameful act and unworthy of a civilized country,” they said in a statement.

The truth is that the decision of the Padua Prosecutor’s Office comes after the Italian Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, sent a few months ago a circulate to all town halls asking them not to recognize the affiliation of minors of homoparental couples.

So that of Padua is not the first case. For example, the mayor of the capital, Roberto Gualtieri, also from the Democratic Party, decided to bypass the government ban and register the children of same-sex couples who come from abroad. Of course, only in the cases of lesbian couples who have their children through assisted fertilization.

“Children come into the world if there is a mom and a dad”

The position of the Executive of Meloni is clear and known. Salvini says that “children come into the world if there is a mother and father. Prosecutors do not intervene because such or such a minister or politician says something, fortunately it is not like that,” he maintains.

In the same way, Luca Ciriani, Minister of Relations with Parliament, thinks: “It is important to start from the fact that the Padua prosecutor’s office limited itself to applying the law, as a Cassation sentence recalls. In Italy, marriage is only between a man and female, so only the biological parent is the parent whose last name can be registered.

Thus, he says, the prosecutor simply applied the law. Although he does so after Minister Piantedosi’s letter, let’s remember. “Mayors are not above the law. Also, it is essential to remember that children’s rights must always be protected, regardless of their parents. They are all equal,” he says.

The Minister for Family, Birth and Equal Opportunities, Eugenia Roccella, has also ruled on this and defends that the law is the law and that the registration of the children of two parents is not legal.