A marriage equality campaigner has expressed his relief at finally being recognised as a widower in the upcoming census.

Richard O’Leary, campaigner and founder of Changing Attitudes Ireland, has said he is “delighted” that he will be recorded as ‘widowed’ in Census 2016. O’Leary’s civil partner, Mervyn Kingston, died before it was possible to upgrade their civil partnership to a civil marriage.

As same-sex marriages are now recognised in Ireland, O’Leary will finally have the option to check the ‘widowed’ box instead of ‘surviving civil partner’ on the upcoming census (April 24).

“For the past two years on official forms in Ireland I have always been boxed as ‘surviving civil partner’, never as ‘widowed’. However, I feel ‘widowed’ and wish to be officially recorded as such,” said O’Leary in an email to The Outmost.

In January, the Department for Social Protection disputed O’Leary’s claim to a widowers pension, since “as no marriage took place he does not have an entitlement to a Widower’s pension”. However, O’Leary does qualify for the Surviving Civil Partner’s Pension which is paid at the same amount but without the same name.

In 2006, O’Leary and his partner Mervyn took a landmark legal case, backed the Equality Authority, against Ireland’s Department of Social Protection (then called Social Welfare) after they were initially refused, as a same sex couple, the couple’s allowance on Mervyn’s Invalidity Pension.

O’Leary says that Census 2016, managed by the Central Statistics Office, have informed him that he can be recorded as “widowed”. He has revealed plans to contact the incoming Minister for Social Protection in the new government to request a review of the decision to label him as “surviving civil partner” and not as “widowed”.