Marriage and Civil Partnership: Minimum Age

Adrian Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 15th May 2019 Westminster Hall

[Fiona Bruce]

My hon. Friend puts her finger on a point that those of us who promote strengthening families make time and again: no single Department is overseeing the issue, because it straddles several Departments. We need a senior Minister, ideally at Cabinet level, to oversee the issues that affect families.

[Mr Adrian Bailey (in the Chair)]

Order. We have a little time available, so I have been fairly lenient in allowing interventions on what should be just a summing-up speech, but I ask hon. Members not to abuse that leniency.

[Mrs Latham]

Thank you, Mr Bailey. The Minister said that there are not many marriages under the age of 18, but actually I think the issue is under-reported: there are more forced marriages than we know about, and we need to protect girls from them.

The hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) spoke about children being able to sign up to the Army. However, it could be argued that that is education and training, because up to the age of 18 they cannot fight on the frontline. That is just what we have legislated for; we want people to stay in education and training until that age.

It is interesting that this debate has come up in National Marriage Week, which is an important thing. I am not trying to stop teenagers who have fallen in love at school, who are love’s young dream and who want to get married, but I think that they can wait until they are 18. There is no compulsion for them to get married that much earlier; waiting would give them time to reflect.

Northern Ireland and Scotland have been mentioned, but the marriage age should probably be a devolved matter, so we should look just at England and Wales. I am sure that Northern Ireland would not disagree that 18 is the right age, but I think Scotland would argue differently.

Finally, I recommend that the Minister reads Jasvinder Sanghera’s book “Shame”, which tells her life story. She has written several other books, including “Daughters of Shame”. Her story is quite sobering. Her sister had a forced marriage under the age of 18; she was taken away, forced to marry somebody she did not know and brought back to this country. It was a very unhappy marriage, and in the end she decided to cover herself in petrol and set herself alight. That was in the streets of Derby; it is very close to my heart. I recommend “Shame” because it shows the realities of forced marriage. It is slightly out of date, because it happened a few years ago, but the point stands.

Increasing the minimum age will not stop forced marriage, but children of 18 are that much more mature and have more of an opportunity to tell their parents, “No, I don’t want to do this. I want to go to university, study and make something of my life.” I urge the Minister to work with other Departments to make our proposal a reality. I will be bringing it back after the Queen’s Speech, so I urge him to get on with it, please.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the minimum age for marriage and civil partnership.