Marriage

Lord Bishop of Hereford Excerpts

Thursday 10th February 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Hereford]

My Lords, I, like others, congratulate my friend and colleague the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester on securing the debate, and thank noble Lords for their excellent contributions, not least the maiden speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler. As others have said, we look forward to hearing more from her in due course. Naturally, like others, I welcome hugely the opportunity for the House to focus on marriage in National Marriage Week. I will say more about that later.

The particular slant of my words will be on and will connect the instability in relationships and families and its consequences with the evidence for the greater stability that marriage provides. Like other noble Lords, I would encourage us as a culture not to be as shy as we have been to speak of marriage and to emphasise the evidential base that it is right and good. As we acknowledge in the marriage service, it is a gift of God in creation: a gift not just for the couple but for society. We ignore this at our peril.

I give a few statistics. Children are more likely to live in poverty where there is family instability. Women are 40 per cent more likely to enter into poverty after separation. There is likely to be poorer adult physical and mental health. Family instability in one generation makes it more likely, tragically, in the next. Conflict might be a cause of the breakdown of a relationship—whether marriage, cohabitation or civil partnership—but it can also be a consequence of that breakdown. We have already been reminded by several of your Lordships of the huge cost to the national purse—a cost that is not only to be measured in cash terms, but is in cash terms horrendously large.

By contrast, there is huge evidence that marriage makes for more stable relationships and therefore gives a base for our children to be brought up in more stable homes. Currently two-thirds of all first marriages can be expected to last a lifetime. Less than 10 per cent of cohabiting relationships have lasted 10 years. Less than 5 per cent of children whose natural parents are still together when they are 16 will become unmarried parents. Harry Benson’s research, published only two months ago, shows that unmarried families account for 80 per cent of the cases of family breakdown and apparently 86 per cent of the costs. We have been reminded already of the statistics that the parents of children born of married couples are hugely more likely—I was told 10 times more likely—to stay together until their children are 16, compared with just 7 per cent of cohabiting couples, which is a tenth of that figure. The evidence is there and we need to speak of it, encourage it and strengthen it.

There is another aspect of the social dimension of marriage that we pick up in our marriage service. The priest asks the congregation, “Will you, their family and friends do all in your power to uphold them, this couple, in this marriage?”. That is a lovely addition to our service that picks up a profound truth. We all—those of us who are married, as I am—need the friendships, families and encouragement around us for support at critical points.

We have been reminded of the aspiration of young people to be married. That prompts us to ask, “What are the barriers?”. I was at the launch of National Marriage Week two days ago, at which the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the right honourable Iain Duncan Smith, spoke excellently. He was prepared to speak of the couple penalty and say unequivocally that his department will look at changing the benefits system to remove that penalty, which is undoubtedly one of the barriers. Another barrier, which has already been referred to, is the issue of stability prior to a wedding—stability from work and from having a home. We could do so much more to reduce the level of break-up if more guidance was available and, as the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, said, available early. Marriage preparation is mostly in the hands of voluntary agencies and particularly in the hands of the church. That, too, is something that we could encourage far more.

In conclusion, 90 per cent of our young people aspire to be married, which is something to celebrate and rejoice in. Let us, therefore, not only help them to be better prepared and support them in it, but do so by making early support available. We should encourage the professionals with whom they have contact to be better able to recognise some of the signs and better able to pass them on for more professional counselling and support when that is needed. I would be grateful for the Minister’s affirmation of the greater resources to be put in for that support—perhaps a higher proportion than our Prime Minister has already offered. For the sake of children, parents and society as a whole, let us be bolder in celebrating, encouraging and delighting in marriage itself.