Time to divorce wedding ceremonies from the state, says Marriage Foundation
It’s time to get the State out of wedding ceremonies, by adopting an EU style, universal system that regulates the legal aspects of marriage, while allowing couples to choose how and where they celebrate their wedding, says Marriage Foundation.
The call to move to a simple universal system of marriage, conducted by registrars, comes in response to the Government’s consultation on marriage reform, Tying the Knot: Reforming weeding laws in England and Wales, which closes on Thursday.
While supporting many of the proposals to improve the information provided to those considering tying the knot and beefing up safeguarding measures to stop forced or coerced unions, the UK’s leading pro-marriage think tank, say the consultation is a missed opportunity to radically overhaul the system and dispel the myth of “common law marriage”, which nearly half of people (47 per cent) believe.
Marriage Foundation is publishing its response to the consultation, in a hope that it will stimulate a wider debate on benefit of marriage and the role of the state in the institution.
“We particularly welcome the proposed strengthening of the civil preliminaries process and the recognition that registration officers already have an important safeguarding role”, the group says, “however, we believe the consultation has missed a more fundamental option which should be properly considered before legislation is finalised: universal civil marriage. The Government's proposals retain the basic assumption that the state should regulate the wedding ceremony itself, albeit through a more flexible system based around officiants. We suggest that the Government should instead distinguish between marriage as a legal status and a wedding as a celebration.
“The state's legitimate interest is in ensuring that a marriage is legally valid, freely entered into, properly registered and protected against abuse. There is no equivalent need for the state to regulate how, where or by whom a couple subsequently celebrates that marriage.”
Their response continues: “Under such a system, every couple would complete the same civil registration process, including the necessary identity, eligibility, consent and safeguarding checks, and the marriage would then be registered by the existing civil registration service. The couple would thereafter be free to hold whatever religious, humanist, cultural or personal celebration they wished, wherever they wished and with whoever they wished.
“This is not an untested or uniquely British idea. France, Germany and Switzerland all require the legal marriage to be conducted through the civil authorities, with religious ceremonies being separate from the creation of the legal marriage. In France, marriage is celebrated before an officer of civil status at the mairie and a religious marriage cannot precede it. In Germany, marriage may only be contracted before a registrar, while a religious ceremony is optional. In Switzerland, marriage must be concluded at the civil status office following a preparatory procedure.”
The consultation, goes on to argue that introducing a universal marriage system administered by existing registrars in England and Wales, would be cheaper, easier and more accessible. It would also remove any need for training, monitoring, and regulating potentially thousands of marriage officiants who would be given the legal right to register marriages.
“Universal civil marriage would also provide an exceptional once-in-a-generation opportunity for Government to explain publicly what marriage is, what it is not, and why it matters. A major change in marriage law would inevitably attract substantial public and media attention, including debate about the future role of the established Church. That attention could be used to make one fundamental point unmistakably clear: there is no such thing as common-law marriage in England and Wales…
“…This could materially change the context in which policy on cohabitation is considered. If people understand that cohabitation does not confer the legal status of marriage, and understand clearly the rights and responsibilities which accompany marriage, the argument that additional legal rights are required because couples are simply unaware of their status becomes substantially weaker.”
Marriage Foundation concludes by saying: “The consultation currently places considerable emphasis on the regulation of weddings, locations and officiants, while the importance of marriage itself receives much less attention. We believe the emphasis should be reversed: the state should take marriage seriously by protecting and properly registering the legal institution, while leaving couples free to decide how they celebrate it.”
Dr Harry Benson, research director of Marriage Foundation and author of the consultation response, commented: “There is much within these proposals to welcome, however it shows a spectacular lack of ambition and even fails to properly consider what is done in most of the EU. By creating a universal marriage system, which deals with the legal side of the union in a registry office and safeguarding, you could at a stroke of a pen end the confusion around the myth of common law marriage and allow all couples to celebrate their wedding in a style and custom of their choice. This could be religious, or secular. Importantly it would remove the stranglehold of only licensed venues being allowed to conduct weddings, or under these proposals an army of official celebrants. This would democratise wedding ceremonies and could dramatically drive down the cost of weddings, which we know according to our research, puts off three in 10 (30 per cent) of young people aged between 18-30.
“In short, we think the Government should be much bolder and take this opportunity to end the confusion and ambiguity of who and where you can get married and the legal side of the union. Embracing a system that is widely used across Europe would do this and not require creating a whole new system and regulatory regime. As we have said in our submission, the State has a legitimate interest in promoting and regulating the legal side of marriage, but it has no business at all in trying to regulate wedding ceremonies.”