of the age of consent in relation to such conduct." The Court held by 14 votes to 5 that it was not necessary also to examine the case under Article 14 taken in conjunction with Article 8, which would otherwise have meant considering the aspect of discrimination. It stated that "once it has been held that the restriction on the applicant's right to respect for his private sexual life give rise to a breach of Article 8 by reason of its breadth and absolute character, there is no useful legal purpose to be served in determining whether he has in addition suffered discrimination as compared with other persons." Minority opinions were written on both aspects. Significance This was the first case at the European Court of Human Rights to be decided in favour of LGBT rights. It was only the thirty-fifth case judged by the Court, and the fifth violation found against the UK. There have been upwards of ten thousand more cases judged at Strasbourg. As a consequence of the judgment, male homosexual sex was decriminalised in Northern Ireland in October 1982. Female homosexual behaviour was never criminal anywhere in the United Kingdom. The MPs from Northern Ireland who voted on the proposed decriminalising Order were universally opposed. In the Article 50 settlement of 24 February 1983, no damages were awarded, the verdict being seen as sufficient reward for the hurt and pain suffered. Costs of £3,315 were awarded towards Dudgeon's legal fees but he was denied the remaining £1,290 because of a view by the Court that his then lawyers were operating on a contingency basis. Three of the five judges who voted against him on the main case and the British judge constituted a majority of the seven judges on the settlement court panel. A Freedom of Information Request later revealed a note from a Conservative minister from that time, saying, "Put this to one side; Strasbourg will do the needful." This implied that although sympathetic to Dudgeon's case, the UK government preferred using the European Court of Human Rights to change the law in Northern Ireland rather than intervene itself. The same provision of the 1885 Act was still in force in the Republic of Ireland, and upheld by the Supreme Court of Ireland in 1983. Norris v. Ireland (1988), successfully challenged this in the ECtHR, with Dudgeon serving as the key precedent. This led to