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Perching here and gathering my thoughts ...

New marriage laws are stupid

21 December 2004 ~ 17:44

From February the UK is introducing new rules to supposedly stop bogus marriages taking place. Intent to marry a non-European Union citizen will involve having to give notice at specially appointed register offices and getting Government approval that the marriage can go ahead.

I think this notion is completely ridiculous. I can't see the logic at all. No other country says who can and can't marry there. It is the issue of whether you intend to set up home there that is at question.

Say a British Indian and an Indian national want to marry in the UK in order to satify family obligations�Indians have huge weddings which are very important�but they intend to live in India afterwards. In other words, the Indian national doesn't have nor technically need a UK fianc� visa. How exactly do they prove their intentions to 'satisfy' the UK authorities?

You know, just because a couple including a foreign national marry in the UK does not mean the Home Office has to give them permission to live here. If they marry here without a fianc� visa then fly back to their home country to get a spousal visa, and the British Consulate they apply to does not think the marriage is genuine, they can be refused their visa. And without the spousal visa, married to a Brit or not, they cannot legally work.

Immigration officers also have the power to turn away a foreign national trying to enter the UK with the intent to marry a Brit and stay in the UK if they do not have a fianc�/e visa.

All this stupid rule will do is spell the end for the fianc�/e visa�couples will just marry in the foreigner's country to bypass the need to get the UK's permission to marry. Already apparantly the number of Fiance visas issued compared to Spousal visas is very small.

Another thing I think the UK is being very blinkered about is the tourist industry. Many countries/places have done very well from 'selling' the idea of getting married there, eg Florida, Cyprus, Italy, Ireland, Las Vegas, The Caribbean, Kenya, Sri Lanka, etc. Many people consider the UK a very romantic place to marry with its wonderful castles (esp. Scotland) but the UK marriage laws have already been screwed up with red tape (since, I think, 2000).

Before then, you used to be able to get married 48 hours after giving notice if you paid extra for a special licence. Now the minimum amount of time to get married is 22 days from arriving in the UK (unless you make two trips, the first to give notice). Nobody is really going to do that if neither of the couple is British.

It is a real pity the the UK Government rushes into these hair-brained schemes (like ID cards) without properly thinking them through.


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