Registration of Marriages Regulations 2021

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing these regulations. This is indeed a historic event, the first changes to the content of a marriage register since 1837. It is a pleasure to be here today, having had the privilege of successfully taking the Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration etc) Bill through this House in 2019. I give special credit to my honourable friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham, Tim Loughton, who so successfully secured and piloted the Bill through Parliament in the first instance and has worked so hard to champion these issues. True to form, he spoke passionately about these regulations and raised several probing questions in Committee in the other place earlier this month. While I do not want to repeat everything that was said, I hope that the Minister will use this debate to clarify and inform the House on some of the points that he raised.

I also take this opportunity to pay tribute to Linda Edwards and her team in the civil registration directorate at the General Register Office, who have worked so long and hard on this issue and been so enormously helpful. I also reiterate thanks to those on all sides of this House who took part in the Bill.

I understand that everything has been hugely impacted by the coronavirus pandemic but I still question that it has taken so long to bring forward these changes. The Bill became an Act in February 2019 with strong government support and became law after Royal Assent last May. I agree with views already expressed by others that the position should have changed soon after that, especially in light of the fact that the Act includes a sunset clause which provided that if the changes were not made in just over a year, the legislation would fall and we would have to start all over again. It is indeed disappointing that this has taken so long.

As noble Lords will know, there are four sections of the Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration etc) Act 2019: marriage registration, extension of civil partnership, report on registration of pregnancy loss, and coroners’ investigations into stillbirths. These regulations address only the first two issues, and while I emphasise that this is most welcome—indeed, as a mother, I still find it most extraordinary that it has taken so long for mothers legally to be allowed to sign the register—I would like to use this debate to seek clarity on progress on the other two issues.

Previously described as the Bill of hatches, matches and dispatches, this light-hearted reference, while apt, perhaps did not convey the emotional and personal impact wrapped up in the fourfold practical purpose of the Act. During the initial debates, one could not fail to be moved by the sensitive issues and some of the personal stories and speeches that were given, not least those relating to coronial investigation of stillbirths, an issue that has touched me personally. Can my noble friend the Minister therefore please update the House on what progress there has been on the consultation under the Act for coroners to be able to investigate babies who die at birth without independent life?

Similarly, what progress has there been on the consultation under the Act for registration of children who are stillborn before the arbitrary and artificial existing 24-week threshold? I had been given to understand that the Minister in the other place was going to write to Tim Loughton to explain progress on these two consultations, but I gather that no letter has yet been forthcoming. However, I expect that my noble friend the Minister will have anticipated my raising these questions in the light of the debate in the other place and my Written Questions tabled last week, so I very much hope that she is in a position to give the House a detailed update.

That aside, I give my wholehearted support to the regulations before us today. They are indeed a historic and much-needed step forward, better reflecting family circumstances in society today. I very much hope that colleagues in this House will give these regulations their support and consequential safe passage, as indeed they did with the Act.