Introduction

This chapter turns to the question of reform, proposing specific reform proposals showing in detail how the consolidation, simplification and modernisation of the law on intimate adult relationships should be achieved. These will rest on our two points of principle. The first is that the legal redress should be provided to those in unregistered religious marriages where the failure to comply with registration requirements is unwitting or is not truly voluntary by one of the parties. The second is that non-religious ceremonies including those conducted by independent celebrants should be legally binding.

Outline of the reforms needed

The Law Commission's proposals, examined in the last chapter, would mark an important step forward but would not be sufficient, for two reasons: first, the Law Commission is hampered by its terms of reference, meaning that, as it concedes, it can only mitigate the unregistered marriage issue; second, there are a few shortcomings in what the Law Commission proposes, especially in relation to the definition of belief systems and the fact that independent celebrants are treated differently. This means that the Law Commission's proposals will not completely fulfil either of the two points of principle. Moreover, there is a significant risk that the Law Commission's recommendations may be cherry-picked by the government rather than enacted in full. This would be disastrous, given that the strength of the Law Commission's proposals is that they come as a complete package.

The reform proposals discussed in this section also come as a complete package. They develop and refine the Law Commission's proposals, drawing upon comparative examples. However, they go further than the Law Commission's terms of reference. The focus needs to be not just on weddings law reform or even marriage law but on the law regulating intimate adult relationships. There needs to be a new statute – say, an Intimate Adult Relationships Act – which would consolidate and modernise the law on marriage and civil partnerships for both opposite-and same-sex couples, as well as introducing certain rights for cohabitating couples. This would replace existing restrictive rules that indirectly discriminate against some religious traditions which exclude non-religious ceremonies and ceremonies conducted by independent celebrants and which provide virtually no rights for cohabitees on relationship breakdown.

This section will outline the main changes that need to be made and, where appropriate, will show how this change could be drafted in legislation.