Consultation on unmarried couples sharing assets when they break up

[CruCru]

There’s a thing in the Times today which says that there is a consultation on unmarried couples sharing assets after a break up. Pretty much, if they separate they could be entitled to a share of a house sale and maintenance. They could also be given automatic inheritance rights if their partner dies without leaving a Will.

The proposal is that people who live together for three years or who have a child together would have these rights.

AIBU to be a bit conflicted on this? On the one hand, I really wish schools covered marriage and the rights and responsibilities it gives you. I’ve talked to women (who live with their partners) who were really taken aback to find out that they didn’t automatically get the same rights as married couples. On the other hand, when I was young (late teens / early twenties), I lived with a boyfriend who was a bit of a sponger - I’d have been really annoyed to find out that he was entitled to any of my money when we split up.

Actual unplanned pregnancies where contraception is correctly used is very rare.
(as distinct from couples who have decided to stop using contraception and taking a 'if it happens it happens' attitude).

I'm going to be blunt and say that as women usually take responsibility for contraception if there is a pregnancy owing to consensual sex it's because the woman deliberately 'forgot' to use it correctly.

I don't see why the rest of society should suffer for this 'lapse' by having draconian measures put on their love lives.

What next? Surveillance cameras in people's bedrooms to see if they're in a relationship or not?

This is a terrible idea and is a licence for serial cocklodgers to use to exploit women. Legislators are envisioning it as protection for vulnerable women but however it is drafted it will be exploited. So all a cocklodger has to do is find a financially employed and stable woman to woo, and get her pregnant, and he gets a slice of her assets. Bonus!

Rather than this the better use of legislative time and effort would be to tighten up child maintenance processes to force all absent genetic fathers to provide proper support for their children and close off all the loopholes that allow them to get away with providing derisory small amounts or not paying anything at all, whilst still enjoying a comfortable lifestyle themselves. It should not be possible for an absent father to enjoy a better level of lifestyle affluence than his children.

I wouldn't be opposed to the creation of some kind of "half way to marriage" contractual state where cohabitors could sign an agreement (costing no more than £50) which sets out the financial terms of their agreement and provides some kind of structure in the event of the relationship ending or an unexpected death, but it should not be a default state that you get automatically recategorised into without it being an active choice.

Absolutely loads of posts on here where women want to break up with their lazy boyfriend and fortunately they own the house. Perhaps because more women use this website but also women are probably more likely to retain the family home after a divorce because the kids stayed with them (so they still own it when a boyfriend moves in).

I wouldn't be so sure that men mostly own the homes in cohabiting relationships without seeing the statistics.

He wouldn’t have the choice to ‘opt out’.

vs the current set up where the less wealthy ex partners, their DC and the state pay.

So because some people might end up in a bad situation because they didn’t pay attention to what not being married would mean, we want to fix that by having a different set of people end up in a bad situation because they didn’t pay attention to what cohabiting would mean?

If people can’t get their heads around the very simple concept of marriage contract, how on earth will people get their heads around a nebulous concept of “cohabiting as a couple”? Imagine the stress of vexatious litigation from an ex. Given our woefully overstretched legal system, these could go on for years (and would add even more work to the system).

I’ve been aware of the de facto Australian system for many years and I’ve always thought the opt-in via explicit marriage in the UK vastly superior. It’s simple and clear. I wouldn’t want any doubt on what my financial responsibility to someone is.

Much better to make the existing laws work. As many have said, make CMS work properly and have actual teeth, and educate even more about the lack of protection outside or marriage/civil partnership. That education should spell out to young women exactly how women sleepwalk into these bad situations.

My partner would happily marry me, so this isn't a situation where I want marriage and can't have it. I simply don't want marriage or civil partnership myself.

I respect your point of view, and I think we probably just won't agree. You feel marriage/civil partnership should be the only route to legal protections whereas I don't.

There are plenty of long term, committed couples who consciously choose not to marry. If adults want to actively opt into legal protections outside of marriage, I don't really see the issue with giving them that choice.

They so have that choice - civil partnership.

To form a civil partnership, you must:

• Give notice at your local register office (usually at least 29 days in advance)
• Provide ID and proof of address
• Pay a fee

On the day, the legal requirement is simply that both partners sign the civil partnership schedule in front of a registrar and two witnesses.

This is not a ceremony.

I had to sign contracts when buying a house with witnesses. It was hardly a ceremony.

I had to get docunents witnessed and verified by a notaire - again not a ceremony.

ETA - registering births and deaths are also done at the registrar office, but not ceremonies either.

I've read your responses and those of the other PPs.

You say, "If adults want to actively opt into legal protections outside of marriage, I don't really see the issue with giving them that choice."

A civil partnership is the opt-in offer and choice? Its not a marriage and is specifically designed to give legal protections. I don't understand why you don't think this is sufficient and another law is needed. What do you think is the difference between civil partnership & the proposed law? What do you going are the issues with civil partnership?

No that’s what the OP said, based on a Times article which misinterprets the proposals. Unlike divorce where there is principle of sharing, the proposals are based on a principle of need. In your example, she has her own, good salary, and they don’t have children, so she isn’t dependent on him. He isn’t expected to share assets as they aren’t married.

Civil partnership is still ‘opting in’.

I don’t think it’s about ‘education’: good information is freely available.

It’s more about power dynamics and money between couples, especially but not only with DC, writ large by the dynamics and money at the national level. ‘The personal is political’ and all that.

I’d like to see some academic analysis of costs / benefits / impacts on different groups of different countries’ policies and laws. Interesting!

I don’t understand your “on the one hand” and “on the other hand” comment as they aren’t remotely the opposite of each other? Those people that think they have the same rights as married people have not done the most basic of thinking / checking / asking someone with the ability to think or check.

People living in tents in Australia (and there are none of those in the UK, really??) are not doing so because they don't want to cohabit with their partners. Nor is the housing crisis related to cohabiting laws. Why do people make up this sort of nonsense.

I will never understand people who think marriage is a bigger commitment than children, and will happily have kids with someone but bulk at the idea of marriage.

Children are living beings who tie you to another forever. if you split up you will still have a connection to that other person through your child, every school issue, parents evening etc, you will have to liaise with the other parent. They will be there at graduation, birthday parties, weddings, and be the grandparent to your grandchildren too.

People are happy to sign up for that lifetime commitment of children so why not get married.

So you don't want marriage or civil partnership- for personal reasons, but you just want to alter the law of the land for everyone so you can have those same protections without getting married or a civil partnership. Rightio then.

I completely agree - but we still can't forcibly 'marry' people against their active will, based on an outsider's opinion that they 'should' be married but just haven't quite got around to it, bless 'em.

I think it's an issue for older people for sure. There are plenty who want their kids to inherit and therefore don't want to get married but living together is a good option to have companionship and support.

Absolutely daft idea. If you want to share assets you get married. People who want to keep finances totally separate should still be allowed to live with their partners.

I didn't say the housing crisis is related to co-habiting laws in Australia.

I have no idea if co-habiting laws are contributing to the homelessness crisis and neither do you - unless this research has been done and you have studied it?

Edit: And of course it wouldn't be people choosing to live in tents rather than live with a partner (wtf) it would be the knock on effects of more people choosing not to combine households meaning more houses are needed overall.

The government consultation - thank you to the PP for the link - seems clear it’s primarily around seeking to redistribute money / assets to the financially vulnerable. (Thereby reducing costs to the state - fair enough)

Not enough figures in the consultation, for example about the numbers of women / DC in the situations it describes.

It could be done in addition to changes to the framework for child maintenance.

I remember reading many years ago about Stirling Moss. He was at that time a greatly celebrated racing driver, and he'd won numerous prizes for it, but for some reason he had never actually taken a driving test, so whilst he could freely drive on private racing circuits, he was strictly not allowed to drive on public roads.

He came to a point in later life whereby he did want to be able to drive on public roads; so the solution that enabled him to gain this legal status was... for him to take and pass an official driving test, the same as everybody else - which I'm guessing wasn't a difficult task for him, but he still had to do it. There were no suggestions of him being told that he was clearly a great driver, so he needn't bother as everybody could see he was good at it.

It would be the same when Simon Calder's passport expires. Nobody is saying that, because he's travelled so extensively, productively and without issue throughout the world for many years, we all know that he's fine to keep on doing so anyway, and don't worry about 'just a piece of paper'. No, when his passport expires, he has the same legal options as everybody else: either the active choice to apply for a new passport and freely travel; or otherwise the default choice to accept that he is not allowed to leave the country.

If anyone is interested, this is the legal situation in Ireland with regard to cohabiting couples. I wanted to see what other countries do (or don't), and googled Ireland as our nearest neighbour with similar laws to UK in many respects. Inheritance laws are different though as are taxes. Interesting for comparison purposes and it might be something the legislators are looking at for a starting template! I don't know - only guessing.

https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/birth-family-relationships/cohabiting-couples/rights-of-cohabiting-couples/

Those aren’t at all relevant comparators @AWeeCupOfTeaAndAnIndividualFruitTrifle

for example, those individuals’ choices were highly unusual, didn’t affect anyone else economically, nor cost the taxpayer anything.

You implied it.

I really really doubt if cohabiting laws are contributing to homelessness. De facto laws have been around for decades here so it’s no big deal. It’s normal.

One of the factors contributing to homelessness is greedy investors buying up multiple properties and charging ridiculously high rents for them or refusing to rent to families, single mums or people with pets. People are put into financial stress trying to pay rent and have nothing left over to try to save up a deposit to buy their own home. Meanwhile house prices keep going up and up. The federal government is currently bringing in laws around capital gains tax, negative gearing and investors to try to correct this a bit. Investors now hate the government but it might actually be allowing first home buyers a real chance of buying a property.

All of that, plus not enough new homes being built, and fucking air bnb taking homes off the long term rental market because greedy investors can make more through short term rental like air bnb.

No need to be rude, it's just an internet forum :)

I think you've created an argument I haven't actually made.

I've repeatedly said I support opt-in protections rather than automatic rights through cohabitation, and I've repeatedly said I am not arguing for complete marriage level protections without marriage.

My position isn't "give me marriage without marriage." It's simply that perhaps the only options shouldn't be "formal legal union" or "nothing." There are millions of long term cohabiting couples that will welcome this.

If it's opt-in, it doesn't really affect people who don't want it.

That said, the consultation has only just begun and some posters have raised valid concerns that will need to be addressed.

The “opting in” that @Happyworm3 is describing is literally just marriage or a civil partnership. How would it be any different? Why do you need a third option?