Cohabitation Rights - campaign from Rights of Women

[ArabellaScott]

https://www.rightsofwomen.org.uk/cohabitation-rights/

Campaign here from the organisation Rights of Women.

I'm wondering if there may be arguments against it, or any unintended consequences?

Anyway, info here, plus template letter should you wish to write to your MP.

'We want the Government to change the law, so women’s rights to justice and safety aren’t dependent on their marital status.
The Law Commission and Women’s and Equalities Commission have recommended introducing legal protections for separating cohabitational partners with children, and that cohabitational partners should have the right to inherit from each other.'

But when it comes to benefits, it's the government deciding whether you need/qualify for receiving money from the government (yes, I know it's people's taxes, but...).

This proposal suggests that it would be the government deciding whether or not somebody else with whom you may/may not be/have been as close as a couple who freely chose to marry should be made to give you their money.

I find it really helpful to try and think about what the legal elements of the law are trying to describe, Because marriage has specific legal forms, and social forms, but they kind of revolve around what is a kind of emergent biological/social phenomena.

It's really about a couple, who will usually eventually have offspring (at least historically and usually even now) going from being two separate economic units, to being one single economic unit.

They will still each engage in what is broadly economic activity, be that agriculture, hunting, caring for kids, maintaining the home, or working at a factory. But the efforts and benefits and sacrifices are managed as a whole, balancing the best overall outcome for all. It's kind of a natural for of everyone giving according to their abilities and what's best for the group, and each taking according to their need, again within the context of the overall health of the group.

Much like a communal tribal economy, there is no good way to untangle who owns what. They are an economic entity with parts rather than a group of 30 independent economic entities.

Marriage laws and customs are usually intended to keep intact the integrity of that entity and make sure it works for the long term health of society, and also protects the interests of the individuals. (Which some places do better than others!)

So any individual entering that kind of agreement finds they both gain and lose, and that it comes with obligations as well as benefits.

Yes, I hadn't realised when I started the thread. English/Welsh and Scots law is different on many of these issues. I expect N Ireland is, too.

Adding it in to PSHE (not sure what this is called in England/Wales!) at school would seem sensible.

A briefing in basic law and economics that applies to most people would seem one of the most important things to learn, yet instead children are given, apparently, lessons on gender, and sex, and religion, but fuck all on legal rights and obligations in life.

I agree with this. I would add things like credit cards, bank accounts, mortgages, interest payments and so on, but teachers are already overwhelmed and resigning due to too much work and to an extent I don't blame them.
Then you have to consider how many children and young adults can barely read and add up, never mind anything else and it all seems pretty impossible.

I don't agree with this, as it is essentially marrying people off without their consent. I would never marry again, as it would give a man rights over my home and I don't want anyone to accrue those rights, so this law would mean I have to live alone forever.

I disagree with this.

Mainly because of the cocklodger risk.

There have already been unintended consequences of divorce law- the wide ranging rights which basically makes both parties entitled to half the matrimonial pot each, was based on the old fashioned view of a male breadwinner and female homemaker. The expectation that both worked hard, but in different ways.

Granted, there are some situations where the wife is the main breadwinner and the husband homemaker, but in the vast majority of situations where the woman has the assets, she is usually doing both while the man does nothing.

I was married for 5 years to a cocklodger. He had nothing. No pension, no property, no savings and only had a job because I supported him while he studied. Because we had DC, he was entitled to half my pension, home and savings so he could provide a home for his kids. At least I could have avoided this if I hadn’t got married.

i think the rights should be tied to the kids. So if a father deserts the family, he has a financial responsibility to support the kids and their mother ( as main carer). Otherwise, I think both parties should expect to be able to raise their children according to their own means.

I don't agree. My brother lives in Australia and I think from what he has said the situation is more like this. He is divorced and won't enter a new relationship easily because apparently if the person he is in a relationship with spends more than X nights a week at his house after a certain time she has a claim on his assets. Insane. He has children and his assets should go to them not some girlfriend who spends too much time at his house.

Exactly. DS is in this position. He has moved in with a woman with children. Into her home which she owns. He has his own home which he rents out. That is his security. If they split up he moves back to his rented out home and she keeps hers for herself and the children. How could it possibly be fair if he gets to keep part of hers as well? They are not married for a reason!

Well, let's hope the Labour government don't give in to the unions (of one of which I am a member) and get rid of the phonics check and mandatory systematic synthetic phonics, because even more children won't be able to read.

However, schools are not there to teach about credit cards but to pass on the culture, giving a knowledge rich curriculum (which also improves reading skills since you can't understand a text full of information you don't know about). Good arithmetic and maths teaching would solve the credit card, budgeting problems I think.

As a never married mother who was (obviously) not married to the father of her children I don't agree with this. I was the wealthier party in the relationship and I didn't want my ex to get my property. I want it to go to my daughters.

I do think we need better child maintenance systems so that men are fairly contributing to their children. It shouldn't matter if the parents are married or not - they should still both contribute to the raising of their children. CMS is not fit for purpose

I’m not disputing I had a very inadequately prepared and stupid parent. The main issue being neither they or the partner wanted a grown up conversation about what would happen when they got ill, older, and died. Head in sand stuff . Parent clearly couldn’t bring themselves to leave everything to partner outright ( bloody easier for us as house would be entirely their partners and THEIR families problem now ), as our other deceased parent would have turned in their grave 🤷🏼‍♀️🤣. So they botched it with a uk solicitor who clearly did precisely as asked and didn’t dig at possible issues and risks given their particular circumstances. In other circumstances what’s written would have worked fine.
so they did take legal advice, but really didn’t want to think about reality of old age infirmity, illness and dying. Heck, they never even said anywhere in legal docs whether they wanted burial or cremation.

common law stuff in Canada just helped them avoid making difficult stark decisions legally and financially, which they have now dumped on us, for potentially years, to pick up pieces. I made comment as you raised how Canada had some laws like what’s being proposed..and it made me wince and 🤬🤯

so it all does go back again to education , and to the inevitability that there are 2 sorts of people….first group is them like me who want to ensure they cover basis with legal and financial security because I’m a morbid pessimist and the other group of raving optimist who “ hope” they’ll never get sick, die or break up so it will all be fine not getting married and ensuring legal and financial safety net exists.

i guess not much we can do about that.

as I say I’ve skin in both games, 30 year marriage followed by divorce. Marriage is a clear simple legal and financial framework for relationships and even handling when that breaks down. We need to be clearer about this in educating kids from get go. More marriage less wedding. Women particularly are sleep walking into disaster by believing it’s not vital as it’s “just a bit of paper”. That paper is your rights. The only ones you have. We don’t need laws with other bits of paper. Or worse, no paper where people cant consent to that law at all.

You could argue that a massive rewrite in curriculum of maths at gcse level could be BASED around personal financial management might make it more a better curriculum altogether.
similarly marriage and other legal stuff should be at centre of citizenship curriculum or whatever they call it now.

so not asking teachers to teach more stuff. Change what we teach.

lets face it, have we changed the curriculum in maths fundamentally for probably nearly 60 years since slide rules dissapeared with logarithm. As a joint chem and maths graduate there is a massive opportunity to make maths meaningful, pertinent and less abstract. Yep, gcse improved it somewhat, but so much more opportunities to start based on world we live in now.

and same goes with teaching the legal rights stuff.

Actually I think our school offers a 'maths applications' qualification that does exactly that.

Yes, it's this.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/subjects/zb27hyc

Well that’s good to know…shame it doesn’t replace the basic maths bits 😉

It's an alternative to the standard maths Nat 5. Unfortunately I think it's seen as less desirable by some employers and tertiary ed places.

I rather think the point of maths is to teach the beauty of its abstractions and the ability to use mathematical processes (and arithmetical ones) rather than base the subject around ephemeral things like credit card interest. Teach how to calculate interest, everyone can then apply that knowledge if they wish. Maths is a language, the purpose of teaching it is not so we can add up our shopping lists but that we can reach some understanding of how the world works, which is mathematically.
Basing a subject around 'relevant' stuff generally makes the subject extremely boring, rather than more engaging. 'Relevance' is the antithesis of education. Yours is the view that instead of teaching children the wonders of Beethoven or Shakespeare we should concentrate on pop lyrics because they are more 'relevant'. They are not, and even if they were, they are not going to open up the world and opportunities to all children.

What's "filing taxes"?

Hmmm, lots of assumptions there! I’m a chemist and maths graduate. I have spent a good deal of my career playing in statistical analysis. Ask my kids and they’ll tell you I was very fond of telling them “ maths is a thing of wonder and beauty “.

I started writing a more detailed response, then figured were massively derailing this thread. Very happy to engage in debate on this interesting topic on separate thread if you’d like to start one…think there lots to say on that 😉🤣

This. If you want to be tied financially, get married. Don't take away our choice to live together without having financial responsibility. It would be a nightmare.

I don't like it.

Women are increasingly owning their own property and being financially independent. I know a few women that never want to be married as they value their own financial security above a potentially transient relationship. Their partners are aware of this and look after their own situation.

No one is forced to cohabit without marriage. The protections, and risks, of marriage are quite clear and available to anyone who wants to opt in to it.

I have a feeling more women would be disadvantaged by this, cocklodger boyfriends would have an even greater incentive to go after vulnerable women.

Someone said on another thread about this law change that the cocklodgers would become cockowner-occupiers. This should be something that women opt into, not something that happens by default.

This hasn't been thought through at all.
We need to educate women and girls, not change the law.
Just changing the law will make women just as vulnerable as they are already
I have had very clear conversations with my dc about all of this.
DH and I have gone through our wills, mortgage, life insurance, POA, advantages and disadvantages of marriage, everything with our DC.

Yep, I've had one of these and it worked well. It starts to get complicated if you have children, I believe. I'd be in favour of a standard form of agreement, and VERY MUCH in favour of a public information campaign on the non-existence of 'common law marriage'.