Women’s equality in the UK – A health check

16.1
16.2
16.3
16.4
Article 16 - Equality in marriage and family law
Cohabitation
Following divorce, the law relating to the division of the parties’ property is concerned to achieve
overall fairness between the parties, and in particular to ensure that the welfare of dependent
children is given high priority, that there is no discrimination between contributions made as a
breadwinner or as a homemaker, and that relationship-generated economic disadvantage to a
homemaker and primary carer is compensated. By contrast, when cohabiting couples separate,
none of these considerations apply, and instead the law looks to factors such as legal ownership
of property, financial rather than non-financial contributions, and the common intentions of
the parties as to their respective shares of jointly-owned property. In this process, child welfare
and future needs are completely ignored. This regime operates to the detriment of women who
have been homemakers and primary carers and their children.
As referred to in the Government’s 7th Periodic Report, 1 the Law Commission published its
report, Cohabitation: The Financial Consequences of Relationship Breakdown 2 in 2007;
however in September 2011 the Government announced that it does not intend to take forward
the Law Commission’s recommendations in the current parliamentary term. At a time when
the proportion of cohabiting couple families and of children born to cohabiting couples are
both increasing, 3 there is no justification for this continued discrimination between married
and cohabiting couples and the attendant disadvantage to women separating from cohabiting
relationships and their children. 4
Recommendation:
The Government should take forward the recommendations from the Law
Commission’s report on cohabitation, and explain to the Committee why this has not
happened yet
The Government has also yet to study the effect of the application of the Family Law Act 1996 5 on
the economic situation of women upon divorce as recommended by the Committee in 2008. 6
Forced marriage
In 2010 the Forced Marriage Unit received over 1,735 calls to its helpline on suspected/
potential forced marriage - 86% were from women. 7 There are also issues with learning disabled
1. Government Equalities Office (2011) CEDAW (Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women) report. United
Kingdom’s Seventh Periodic Report. GEO: London http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/publications/equalities/international-equality/7thcedaw-report?view=Binary
2. The Law Commission (2007) Cohabitation: The financial consequences of relationship breakdown. Law Com No. 307 http://
lawcommission.justice.gov.uk/docs/lc307_Cohabitation.pdf
3. Source: Office of National Statistics (2011) Social Trends 41: Households and Families. http://tinyurl.com/bpzx8ur Table 4 (cohabiting
couples increased from 12.5% to 15.3% of all families between 2001 and 2010, while married couples decreased from 72.4% to 68% over the
same period); Table 5 (cohabiting couples with dependent children as a proportion of all families with dependent children increased from
10.9% to 14%, and the proportion of dependent children living in cohabiting couple families increased from 10.1% to 13.4%); Table 6 (46.2%
of births were outside marriage in 2009 compared to 30.2% in 1991); and Table 7 (65.7% of births outside marriage in 2009 were jointly
registered by parents living at the same address).
4. For further information see: Ministerial statement on cohabitation, 6 September 2011 http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201011/
ldhansrd/text/110906-wms0001.htm and The Law Commission (2007) Cohabitation: The financial consequences of relationship
breakdown. Law Com No. 307 http://lawcommission.justice.gov.uk/docs/lc307_Cohabitation.pdf
5. Family law Act 1996 http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1996/27/contents
6. CEDAW Committee (2008) Concluding observations of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women: United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Forty-first session http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N09/555/92/PDF/
N0955592.pdf?OpenElement Para 44
7. Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Home Office, Forced Marriage http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/travel-and-living-abroad/when-things-gowrong/forced-marriage/
Accessed: 26/03/13
162 Women’s equality in the UK: CEDAW shadow report 2013