Forced marriage, pre- and post-pandemic

Shabina Begum Senior Associate Dawson Cornwell

This article reviews the key developments in the area of forced marriage in England and Wales the impact of COVID – 19 and what this all means for family law practitioners. It has been a while since we reviewed this crucial area of law and it appears that like all aspects of our lives which were effected by the global pandemic forced marriage cases were also not spared. One immediate positive impact when the global travel restrictions were implemented was it prevented the removal of victims being taken abroad against their will. But did this in fact reduce the risk of forced marriage or just delay it until the travel restrictions were lifted?  This article takes a look at the way legislation has evolved to award better protection to forced marriage victims moreso in light of coercive control being criminalized. It also takes a glance at the concept of informed consent and what this means in the context of children as due to the gap in the definition of forced marriage legislation there is new legislation on the horizon...

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