Norway loses another child welfare case at the European Human Rights Court
The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruled that Norway violated the right to family life in a child welfare case where foster parents were allowed to adopt a child.
Norway has been ordered to pay EUR 25,000 in compensation to the woman behind the case.
That corresponds to around NOK 265,000 at today’s exchange rate. The state must also cover legal costs of EUR 9,500.
The verdict in Strasbourg was unanimous.
The case concerned a girl who was put into the child welfare service’s care just days after she was born.
Placed in a foster home
The girl was placed in a foster home, and the mother was granted four visits a year, each of two hours.
When the girl was four years old, the mother was deprived of parental rights, and the county council decided that the girl could be adopted.
The mother went to court to change the decision but did not succeed.
The district court believed that the mother would probably be permanently unable to provide the daughter with adequate care.
The mother appealed the case to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg.
Since 2015, the EMD has taken in 40 child welfare cases against Norway, newspaper Dagbladet wrote this summer.
© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today
