Marriage laws in 21st-century Britain are in a terrible state. No-reason, unilateral divorce and same-sex unions defy God’s true design and purpose for marriage.
But it could still be made worse.
The government is consulting on reforming weddings law in England and Wales. Core to the proposals is a shift away from a system based on buildings to a system based on officiants.
Much more than that is envisaged, however. The proposals include people getting married without uttering any words! Where words are used, the proposals do not require any expression of commitment. While the consultation expresses concern about unregistered marriages, there is no proposal to enforce registration of religious marriages to fix this.
The consultation documents are here and you can respond online using the response form.
The deadline to respond is 24 September 2026.
There are 39 questions in the consultation. You do not have to answer all of them. Please use your own words as duplicate responses can be discounted. You do not have to make all the points we suggest. Pick some points that resonate with your views and make them in your own words.
Three key questions to answer
The three most important questions to answer are the following:
Question 5
This question asks whether couples should be allowed to get married without uttering any words, instead expressing their consent by actions. The text of the consultation mentions Islamic rituals and Hindu rituals as examples of consent being expressed by actions and not words.
We recommend answering No.
Points to make in the text box:
- Consent requires uttering words not only actions.
- Words matter. Actions are subject to interpretation.
- Saying words in the presence of witnesses is clear and unambiguous.
- Every other legal contract requires words, whether written or spoken.
- Marriage is a very significant legal contract. It should require words.
- A ceremony without words is open to misinterpretation and misunderstanding.
- The solemnity and dignity and importance of marriage would be undermined if it did not require words.
- Ceremonies and actions can also be included after or before the words are said.
- No one should be able to marry by silence, least of all vulnerable and impressionable girls.
- Requiring words to be said is an important safeguard to ensure consent is properly expressed.
- When someone is unable to speak, sign language, a clear signed statement or some technological communication assistance can be used.
Question 6
This question asks whether you agree with the proposed required words for civil weddings. The proposed words are:
“I [name] accept you [name] as my [husband / wife / spouse]”
We recommend answering No.
Points to make in the text box.
- It is not enough to accept the partner as your husband or wife. There should be a real vow which reflects the seriousness and the lifelong nature of the commitment being entered into.
- As it stands, nothing is being promised in the proposed words.
- The required words must also make promises which clearly show that this is a lifelong and sexually exclusive commitment.
- The wording should include a promise to remain faithful to your wife or husband for the rest of your life.
- The consultation document describes marriage as a ‘lifelong’ commitment no less than thirteen times. Yet there is no requirement for the couple to make a lifelong commitment to each other. This should be a required part of the ceremony.
- The required wording should not allow ‘spouse’. The default terms should be husband or wife.
- How can marriage be described as a ‘lifelong commitment’ if couples are not required to make a lifelong commitment to each other in order to get married?
- For the stability of families, and the benefit of any children, there should be a lifelong exclusive commitment made to get married. The security of children should not rest on no actual promise between the parents.
- The required wording should also include a declaration that there is no lawful impediment to the marriage. This is a safeguard in case circumstances have changed since preliminary checks were made.
- Couples can also personalise their vows, but there should be required legal wording which helps to demonstrate that this is not merely a personal promise, but a legal commitment recognised by the government.
Question 20
This question asks whether there are any other safeguards required to protect against forced or sham marriages and to ensure the safety of ceremonies carried out in private homes. This is the best question to insist that the government enforces registration of religious marriages.
We recommend answering Yes.
Points to make in the text box.
- The government should adopt the recommendation of the Law Commission to create a new offence for an officiant of a wedding ceremony to mislead either of the couple about the legal effect of their ceremony. An officiant should also be guilty of an offence if they do not disclose that a ceremony at which they are officiating will not give rise to a valid marriage. This will serve to protect Muslim women who enter into Islamic marriages without realising that they are not legally recognised. Without this new offence we will continue to have the problem of unregistered Islamic marriages with women having no legal rights if their husband divorces, leaves them or dies.
- Enforced registration of marriages would also serve to prevent polygamy. Indeed, there are many polygamous Islamic marriages that are unregistered too.
- The Council of Europe passed a resolution in 2019 calling on the government to require Islamic marriages to be registered.
- The Independent review into the application of sharia law in England and Wales also recommended in 2018 that Muslim marriages should be required to be registered.
- The consultation document cites evidence from the Channel 4 survey that 61% of Islamic marriages are unregistered, with 28% of them not realising that they did not have legal rights as a result. Moreover, 10% of these Muslim women were in a polygamous relationship, with 37% of those saying they had not agreed to it.
- The Casey Review into integration in 2016 found evidence of up to 100,000 sharia marriages with 70-75% of these not legally registered. It recommended that all religious marriages should be registered to protect against the injustices of unregistered marriages. If the government is serious about tackling unregistered marriages this is what it should do.
- Shifting from buildings to officiants will do nothing to curb the rise of unregistered Islamic marriages.
- A family home is the easiest place to facilitate coercion and predatory marriages.
- A family home is the hardest place for a vulnerable woman to say “no.” Every witness will be chosen by the family. There is no public entrance.
- The officiant must be required to meet separately with each party on the day away from relatives to ensure that there is no coercion and that each party is freely entering into the marriage. If there is any doubt, the officiant should be legally required to put a stop to the ceremony.
- It should be a criminal offence for an officiant to officiate in a sham wedding or a coerced wedding.
- Officiants should have to obtain clear independent legal assent to the wedding from each party, independent of any relatives.
Other questions to answer if you have time
Question 1 asks whether information and signposting be provided on the online notice platform in order to support and safeguard couples including in relation to forced marriage, consent and capacity?
We recommend answering Yes.
Points to make in the free text box.
- Signposting should be provided to the Forced Marriage Unit, and for testing consent and for capacity.
- Signposting should give couples a clear way to opt out of a marriage and seek help and protection if required.
- You can also make some of the points we suggested for Question 20 about the need to enforce registration of religious marriages in order to protect women if they husband divorces, deserts them or dies.
Question 2 asks whether you agree that the type of information the Government proposes should be provided at the online notice stage.
We recommend answering Yes.
Question 4 asks whether registrars should be required to ask questions aimed at identifying forced, predatory or sham marriages.
We recommend answering Yes.
Points to make in the text box.
- It is very important to ensure that there is no coercion going on that all these indicators and resources are discussed.
- It should be a criminal offence for an officiant to officiate in a sham, forced or predatory marriage. This is the only way to ensure that officiants take this seriously.
- Officiants should be required to privately interview each partner away from any relatives to ensure that consent is freely given.
- Requiring registration of religious marriages will go a long way to prevent sham marriages (see our responses to Question 20 above for more points on this).
Questions 8-15 ask about the ‘dignity framework’ which requires the officiant to ensure that there is some level of dignity to the ceremony.
We recommend agreeing with the proposals in these questions.
In the text boxes you can make the following points.
- It is essential that a serious lifelong legal commitment is dignified.
- There is a real danger of weddings being trivialised or turned into a mere social occasion or party.
- What is happening is a serious matter that demands serious surroundings and being taken seriously by all involved.
- The existing system of a recognised place with a public ceremony with open doors and witnesses from the community provides dignity. Replacing all this with an officiant-based system risks undermining the dignity and solemnity of marriage.
- The term ‘dignity’ needs to be clearly and rigorously defined so that it is not a matter of seeking an officiant who is willing to interpret it in the most outlandish manner.
Question 17 asks whether state employed registrars, should not be permitted to lead or participate in religious or non-religious belief content?
We recommend answering Yes.
In the text box you could make the following points.
- State employed registrars should not be seen to be apparently endorsing any religious beliefs besides Christianity since we are a constitutionally Christian country.
- The best protection for this is for state officiants to not be permitted to lead or participate in religious or non-religious belief content that is not Christian in nature.
- This also protects the consciences of those registrars who may not wish to officiate or participate in religious aspects of a ceremony.
- This should not prevent registrars from attending a religious ceremony solely in order to oversee the legal requirements.
Questions 21, 22, 28 and 29 ask about weddings at sea and on cruise ships.
We recommend opposing these this since weddings are not a holiday product but a serious commitment.
Question 23 asks whether officiants should have a legal duty to uphold the dignity and significance of marriage?
We recommend answering Yes.
In the text box you could make the following points.
- The officiant is the person who should be responsible for upholding the dignity and significance of marriage.
- Making this a legal duty is the only way to ensure that officiants take this seriously.
- The legal duty should be clearly defined so that enforcement can take place.
- The officiant should also have a legal duty not to officiate at a sham or forced marriage with a criminal offence of doing so.
- There should also be a criminal offence of misleading the couple about the legal status of a religious marriage (see our answer to question 20 above).
- No officiant should ever be found unfit or struck off for believing, as millions of people do today, that marriage is between a man and a woman. This is a serious a respected and long-held belief in this nation which takes marriage seriously. Protection for this belief by officiants should be written into the law.
The consultation documents are here and you can respond online using the response form.