to think that civil partnerships for heterosexuals are a good idea?

[marantha]

There seems to be so much fuss about marriage/marrying these days that I cannot help but think that allowing heterosexual couples to form civil partnerships like homosexual people would actually be a good idea.

I know some people would already say that there would be no legal difference between couples marrying in a register office at the moment and those straight couples forming civil partnerships- and there would not be any legal difference.

But it would take away the pressure to have expensive weddings (who wants to see two people sign a form?), take the religious aspect out of marrying and allow those who are religious whose previous spouses have left them or died the chance to form another legally-binding relationship without worrying what their religion thinks.

It would debunk the 'don't need piece of paper to love someone' argument because it would NOT be about love - it would JUST be a legal affair.

It would also take away any 'stigma' (not that I PERSONALLY see it as a stigma) of being someone's husband or wife.

AIBU to think that this might actually be a good idea?

What I've never understood is this whole 'common law' man and wife thing.

Isn't it hideously patronising to force legal rights and responsibilities onto a couple who have made a choice not to marry.

If they wanted the rights they woudl get married IMO, so by not, just living together, they have decided they do not wish to be legally bound together. So why then force legal rights onto them after a certain time?

why not just marry

thats a civil partnership ins tit?

StrictlyTory Couldn't agree with you more.

But civil partnerships for heterosexuals would not 'force' rights on cohabitees - a couple would still have to sign a civil partnership of their own free will to obtain rights.

Agree with strictlytory- common law is a minefield and pretty arbitrary. Not everyone wants the legal protection of marriage- if they did they could just........get married.

The current system allows both heterosexual and homosexual couples to formalise their relationship in law.

It ain't broke......why fix it?

Yes I agree. I think that if you decide to just live together there should no absoluetly no legal rights or responsibilities involved in that at all. You should still be treated, 100%, like 2 separtate people in the eyes of the law.

Then if people wanted to become legally bound to each other they could either sign a CP or get married.

Morgan
I will try to clarify - and I may have got yours and coalitions posts mixed up, in which case I apologise.

If you have a civil partnership, you can only have it in a registry office or in a place which is licensed for a civil partnership such as a hotel. You are not allowed by law to hold your civil partnership in a church or other religious place such as a synagogue or mosque. Civil Partnerships by law must not contain any religious references as they are officiated by a registrar and cannot be officiated by anyone else.

When you marry you have a choice to have a Civil ceremony, which is very similar to a Civil partnership, where you again have a registrar and cannot mention God etc, OR you can choose to have a religious ceremony which is also legal binding.

In our case we could not mention God etc and so planned a religious blessing which was to bless our partnership in our religion.

This guide answers a lot of questions about Civil Partnerships -
www.civilpartnershipinfo.co.uk/

Oops www.civilpartnershipinfo.co.uk/

I mean I agree with Marantha (not myself!)that CP's are a choice where as common law marriage is not something you chose, but that gets shoved on you!

Ok marantha but what difference would it make?

If we could wave a magic wand and the govt had the time and money to introduce a CP for hetro couples, with rights what exact difference would it make, what difference is it you would be after?

To establish these rights, act on them, enforce them and negotiate them after a period of time would still be huge red tape, and baggage, much like divorce, with courts and things, if it's a legal agreement you are dissolving and kids are involved/assets. So what would be different?

I think both YABU and YANBU.

I do strongly think that civil marriage and civil partnership should be merged into one type of ceremony with one set of legalities and one legal status. It can be called "marriage", "civil partnership" or even "Norman" for all I care. At present there are differences between the two which, although very minor, are there largely so that the two can be held up as "equal but different" to satisfy opponents of gay marriage. Then couples would be free to have whatever add-on elements or non-legally binding ceremonies (religious or otherwise) they wanted. I'd actually change the law so that everyone needed to have a civil ceremony to be considered legally married/partnered/Normaned, rather than some kinds of religious ceremony giving you that status while others didn't and required a separate civil ceremony.

I think that would be better than extending civil partnership to heterosexual couples without ditching civil marriage.

But I also don't think it will happen any time soon, probably not even in my lifetime.

Thanks PeachMelba, so I take it you are talking about C of E weddings then, as afaik no other religious wedding ceremonies are legally valid on their own?

Morgan I am only talking about weddings where you can go into a church or other religious building and be declared 'Man and Wife' and fill in your documents at the same time.

I could not do that. That is the point I am making.

There is no such thing as 'common law' marriage - and I am glad for it for exactly the reason baggedandtagged states. plenty of people think there is though - and are pretty shocked if (at the extreme end) their other half dies and they face losing their home and custody of their children.

I think the OP is BU - but whatever difference there is between marriage and cp should be removed for the benefit of same sex couples.

there is no point in CPs for those who can already have a registry ofice wedding AFAICS.

The humanists wedding ceremonies are valid on their own.

I'm not sure the "common law" thing is really true - when one of my friends died recently her half of joint assets went to her father not partner of 9 years, but it might just be in Scotland that it is more of a myth. I do think with joint assets you should be forced to sign who the share would pass to in the event of one party dying but agree that the rights shouldn't automatically be the same as those who made the extra commitment.

I would feel uncomfortable with effectively losing some of the legitimate terms and rights of a marriage (down to status of civil partnership), it is too often the argument of the American right - better religions pick a new name for themselves and we upgrade civil partnerships to marriages.

OK... I suppose I was assuming that it would make no difference if the churches were not willing, but I found this article saying that several denominations would support it, and I was assuming they would't. So, yes, I see what you mean in that case. I think it should be up to each religion or church if they wish to perform same sex unions and have the partnership/marriage registered on their premises, yes.

(that was in reply to PeachMelba)

I think humanist wedding ceremonies were only valid on their own in Scotland -- or has that changed now?

Common law means nothing in this country it's a myth as so many people in my DH's job have rammed home to them due to the nature of his job. Marriage/CP or the partner gets nothing and it jeopordises the kids if you have them.

It's a huge commitment to go into marriage/cp so that's why you get extra rights.

Still confused about why people see a cvp as downgrade though and marriage as more important with regards to rights, legally they are the same for legal rights and the process of dissolution follows that of divorce. Which was the whole point.

The only real change that could be made would be for gay couples to be allowed to call it a marriage etc.

If they were going to reform the system it would be better to rool out the changes over a period of time, and phase out the old system by, to be blunt, attrition.

So, for example, you can choose to have a civil wedding, open to all, gay or straight. Religious ceremony first if you like, but then the legal bit has to happen. At the end you are Mr and Ms X, where X is whatever surname each decides to adopt. Men can be husbands, women wives, and both can be parners, spouses, whatever they like. This starts as being in addition to our system, but as an incentive to work towards the new method, maybe it should be cheaper. When takeup starts, it moves towards being compulsory. When it's compulsory, slowly you end up with a system where everyone is on the new roll rather than the old, and old marriage laws become osolete anyway.

I know it's complicated, but I honestly can't see any other way to get round all the red tape other than there being no one getting married in the traditional sense anymore. (And yes, I would do away with Miss and Mrs. People would complain to start with, but in a generation or two it would be what people had grown up with and therefore normal!)

As for not allowing gay couples to have a religous ceremony because it offends people who are anti-gay - if that's the actual reason, why on earth are we supporting such intolerance as a nation?

They could also make the surrounding legalities the same, emmyloulou. At present in a civil marriage it's the ceremony that's the legally binding bit and the register is a recognition of the fact that you've just been married. In a civil partnership it's the actual signatures that are the legally binding bit and no one needs to say anything or have any kind of ceremony at all.

And that must have been done deliberately. Even if they wanted to keep different titles for "marriage" and "civil partnership" it would have been easier just to cut-and-paste the existing legislation and regulations about civil marriage requirements into civil partnership requirements. But they didn't -- they went so far as to spend extra time and money drafting new provisions.

It's only slight technicalitles though isn't it? The legal rights are exactly the same basically. So couples get legal protection asap, without having to wait years whilst the whole law on marriage is re-written to adjust for the minor technicalities.

I don't think it's quite as easy as some seem to think it is to draft new laws as complex as re-writing marital law etc and wave a magic wand and it's done.

It's saying something that civil partnerships are now what 4 years old and only 10 courts in the country can deal with dissolution.

Marital law is 100's of years old and very complex, it would take years and years and lots of money to change it all. I think eventually it will all come as one, but not in the forseeable future. Plus it's time and money that the country does not have right now, people are legally protected, so that's all that matters in the immediate future really minor legal terms aside gay couples now have equal rights financially and with children etc as married couples. It's the same thing with regards to these sorts of rights.

Tott, difficult one, see some religions are anti homosexuality, so you then have religious grounds and sexuality gorunds locking horns, you can't really discriminate against either, so what do you do?

Yes, but they must be deliberate minor technicalities. There's no reason that section 44 of the Marriage Act 1949 (as amended) couldn't have been used as the basis for section 2 of the Civil Partnership Act 2004 rather than the completely new provisions that are there. So it was deliberately giving the same legal rights (hurrah!) while maintaining an air of "no, no, of course this isn't the same thing as gay marriage" (boo!).

Indeed but whilst religion etc is still a huge part of our culture and marriage is traditionally between a man and wife, which has religious roots what can they do. It's down to the various religions. The govt did what it did to give gay couples rights married rights basically without trying to piss off certain religions catch 22.

I think it will be less of an issue in future generations as I think religion will die out.

YANBU

Homosexual couples should be allowed to marry if they wish and heterosexual couples should be allowed a civil partnership.

What I would personally favour would be a partnership arrangement, wholly devoid of any religious and ownership connotations, which identified that the two people are in a relationship, and so allowed to be each other's next of kin, but did not automatically combine property and finances as marriage does.