How Can I Wed Thee? – Let Me Change the Ways: the Law Commission’s Consultation Paper on ‘Weddings’ Law (2020)

Professor Chris Barton, A Vice-President of the Family Mediators Association, Academic Door Tenant, Regent Chambers, Stoke-on-Trent

This article considers the Paper's 91 Consultation Questions covering such areas as preliminaries, 'officiants', ceremonies, locations, registrations, validity and offences, fees, and the impact of the provisional proposals. It admires the provisional proposals whereby legal emphasis would shift from the venue(s) to the officiant(s), and allow for greater choice  with regard to the former and the nature of the ceremony, while suggesting that the 'small print' might qualify such freedoms. Finally it wonders whether the subject's importance justifies this degree of Law Commission attention and whether rendering weddings more appealing is an appropriate way of seducing cohabitants into marriage.

The full article will be published in the March issue of Family Law. 

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Read the full article here.