Civil Rights, Civil Wrongs

Require polygamous Sharia marriages to be registered with the civil authorities? Benefits were being paid specifically for "polygamous partners" when I was working full-time in that field, 10 years ago. Admittedly, we never actually had any in the then District of Derwentside. But the national statutory provision existed.

For the recognition of polygamy to have the tax implications claimed in certain circles today, then there would have to be any fiscal recognition of marriage, simply as such. That recognition was abolished by the Conservative Party when it was last in government, and when it also ended the situation whereby, by recognising adultery and desertion as faults in divorce cases, society declared in law its disapproval of them even though they were not in themselves criminal offences.

Polygamy (which Islam merely permits, and which is really quite rare) certainly has no place in Britain. But now that the debate is open, let us make the most of it. Any marrying couple should be entitled to register their marriage as bound by the law prior to 1969 as regards grounds and procedures for divorce, and any religious organisation enabled to specify that any marriage which it conducted should be so bound, requiring it to counsel couples accordingly.

Statute should specify that the Church of England be such a body unless the General Synod specifically resolved the contrary by a two-thirds majority in all three Houses, with something similar for the Methodist and United Reformed Churches, which also exist pursuant to Acts of Parliament, as well as by amendment to the legislation relating to the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy.

That would be a start, anyway. The marital union of one man and one woman is a public good uniquely and in itself, and the taxation system, among so very many other instruments of public policy, should recognise that fact. It should recognise marriage as a unique public good, to which civil partnerships are not comparable. And it should recognise marriage as a public good in itself, whether or not there are children, a related but different public good of which other forms of recognition rightly exist.

But will any Party Leader say this, as once they would all have done? What do you think?