Coffin Corner

Government and Political

·         Couples should be encouraged to marry, says Iain Duncan Smith

Young couples are being actively discouraged from marrying and ministers should start championing families rather than celebrity culture, a leading Cabinet minister will say today said the front page of the Telegraph this week (and the Guardian, the Express and the Daily Mail), In what is the Coalition's clearest pro-marriage intervention since it was formed, Iain Duncan Smith will say that it is "absurd and damaging" for ministers not to extol the benefits of marriage for fear of stigmatising those who choose not to marry.

The Work and Pensions Secretary will argue that the current system of benefits is "crazy" because it stifles people's genuine aspirations to build and commit to a strong family. He believes marriage has become the preserve of the better off. Mr Duncan Smith will say: "We do a disservice to society if we ignore the evidence which shows that stable families tend to be associated with better outcomes for children." He will add: "There are few more powerful tools for promoting stability than the institution of marriage."

Mr Duncan Smith, a former Conservative Party leader, has embarked on a radical overhaul of the benefits system and he warns that the Government needs to understand better the costs of family breakdown. In a speech as part of Marriage Week UK, he will say: "Over the years the political establishment has frowned if a mainstream politician mentions marriage. The prevailing view was that to extol the virtues of this most fundamental institution somehow meant that you were going to stigmatise those who were not married. This is an absurd and damaging assumption. Government must understand the effect that family breakdown can have on the well-being of both adults and children.

"The financial costs of family breakdown are incredibly high. But what is most painful to see is the human cost – the wasted potential, the anti-social behaviour, and the low self-esteem.” Mr Duncan Smith’s comments will be welcomed by many Tory supporters and MPs who are still waiting for David Cameron to show any sign that he will make good his promise to recognise marriage in the tax system.

The Work and Pensions Secretary will point to surveys of young people showing they aspire to marriage but often find it financially difficult. He will add: “We have to ask ourselves: if people from the youngest age aspire to make such a commitment in their lives, what stops them doing so?”

Mr Duncan Smith warns that those on low incomes are often encouraged to stay single or live together but not commit to marriage, because of the benefits they will lose if they marry. Research by the Centre for Social Justice, a think tank founded by Mr Duncan Smith, shows that a majority of people who are out of work or in part-time work think low-earning and unemployed people are better off living apart than as a couple. The minister will add: “Government cannot and should not try to lecture people or push them on this matter, but it is quite legitimate to ensure people have the opportunity to achieve their aspirations.”

Mr Duncan Smith will also criticise the “celebrity focused media”, where film stars, professional footballers and television soap stars are given awards but fail to identify marriage as a good thing.

He will say: “Fashionably dismissed or taken for granted, the commitment of two people to put selfish interest to one side for the sake of each other and the children they raise is simply the very best of us as human beings. Furthermore, marriage is perhaps the best antidote to the celebrity, self-obsessed culture we live in, for it is about understanding that our true value is lastingly expressed through the lives of others we commit to.”

·         State approves marriage again 

Married couples were given state approval yesterday when Iain Duncan Smith moved to push back Labour’s tide of political correctness reports the Express (and the Daily Mail). The Work and Pensions Secretary announced the phrase “marital status” and the word “marriage” would again appear on official forms. They were removed by Labour eight years ago to promote gay equality. All tax, benefit and immigration paperwork from Mr Duncan Smith’s department will now ask people if they are married, instead of referring to “civil ­status” or “cohabitation”.

The move was welcomed by pro-marriage groups. They said Labour’s removal of ­official references to wedlock was an attempt to downgrade the institution of marriage. It also meant data on ­marriage was no longer ­available to researchers. Dave Percival, organiser of the current Marriage Week, said: “This is a major step forward. The vast majority of independent research shows that whether you are married, rather than just living as a couple, makes a big difference to your life chances and those of your children. By conflating the two terms the Government has lost a lot of valuable insight into what works and what doesn’t. Their decision to recognise the difference is a very positive step in gathering data to help people understand the benefits that being married brings in life.”

Michael Trend, of The Relationships Foundation, said the failure to mention ­marriage wrongly suggested that cohabitation was legally equal to marriage. He said: “Mr Duncan Smith has set a strong lead. I look forward to his cabinet colleagues following suit.”

Think-tank Civitas said: “Marital status on official documentation should not be considered political – recognising marriage has nothing to do with promoting it.”

·         Marriage makes us all richer – not poorer

The cost to the nation of family breakdown is immense. It is time for politicians to act, argues Jill Kirby in the Telegraph .  Is marriage dying of neglect? In a forceful speech yesterday, Iain Duncan Smith suggested as much, arguing that politicians must speak out in order to halt its decline. While promising to invest £30 million in "relationship education" and to tackle the "couple penalty" in the welfare system, the Welfare Secretary insisted that political timidity on this subject has had damaging – and expensive – consequences.

Marriage certainly seems to be going out of fashion. In the UK last year, fewer people got married than ever before, and nearly half of all babies were born outside wedlock. There is a popular assumption that this is a natural process of social evolution – that couples living together are replicating marriage without the formality, so that the label attached to their relationship is irrelevant. This, though, is a myth.

The reality is that among cohabiting parents, the rate of relationship breakdown is more than double that of married families; in Britain, one in five children is born in a home with no father present. As a result, more than a quarter of all children live with just one parent (90 per cent of whom are lone mothers). This figure is way ahead of the European average, and nearly twice the figure in France and Germany. And research shows that children who experience family breakdown, or who grow up without a father in the house, are at far greater risk of disadvantage.

David Cameron is only too familiar with these statistics, and has made powerful speeches in praise of marriage. Indeed, his support for it was at the core of his leadership campaign in 2005. But his own political cohabitation, with Nick Clegg, has led to a toning down of his rhetoric. Clegg's view, articulated most recently in a speech to the think tank Demos, is that government support for marriage amounts to telling people how to live their lives, and that politicians should keep out. That view is supported by most of the Opposition, as well as a few on the Tory benches.

This, however, ignores several important arguments. The first is the cost to the public purse of family breakdown. A report this week by the Relationships Foundation estimates this at

£41 billion a year, taking account of welfare expenditure, legal and care costs, and demands on education, health, and justice spending. Spending £30 million on marriage support and relationship education sounds like a modest but worthwhile investment.

Second, the Left-wing reluctance to recognise and endorse marriage has, perversely, led to much greater state intrusion into family life. This is not just because the steep increase in family breakdown has created greater demand for interventions by the courts and social services. It is also because the decline of marriage as an official description of family status means that the state has to concern itself with the exact nature of couples' relationships – in order to allocate benefits, or to determine the legal redress available to cohabitees who split up.

With the departure of marriage from official language, this problem will only grow. The expansion of parental rights in the workplace, especially paternity leave, has been extolled by both Cameron and Clegg as "family-friendly". But where unmarried households are concerned, such rights can be complex. Should a father living apart from his children be entitled to paternity leave? If so, must he provide proof of fatherhood? The removal of child benefit from households where there is a higher-rate taxpayer poses more questions: if the taxpayer is living away from his own children but sharing a home with another woman and her children, then which mother loses the benefit?

The fact is that when marriage ceases to underpin family life, parental interdependency becomes a complex problem, the solution to which involves detailed government interaction. So putting marriage back into the script should appeal to every true liberal as well as the socially conservative.

A further compelling argument for government to support marriage is to bridge the gulf between aspiration and reality. A surprising number of young people still want to get married, yet it is an ambition they are increasingly failing to achieve. This is not a problem for the wealthy, as Duncan Smith pointed out, but one for those for whom the costs and benefits of family life are finely balanced.

Removal of the "couple penalty" was a Tory election pledge, which IDS plans to put into practice through adjustments to the new Universal Credit. If he retains control of the welfare agenda, he will be tenacious in dismantling such disincentives. He will also be a persistent voice in Mr Cameron's ear, urging him to make good his promise of a tax allowance for marriage.

None of these measures will be enough to propel marriage rates up to their 1970s peak. But the evidence from other countries shows that public policy does have an impact on family formation. Britain is unique in subjecting marriage to a double whammy: support is heavily slanted towards lone parenthood, yet there are no compensating tax allowances for couples. As the Coalition takes its first modest steps towards redressing the balance, IDS's attempts to put marriage back on the agenda deserve the support of all his colleagues, both Liberal and Conservative.

·         Rabbi and Bishop demand marriage tax changes

Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks and a senior Church of England bishop have joined forces to call for the tax system to be used to support marriage reports the BBC.

The Bishop of Chester, the Rt Rev Peter Forster, who tabled the debate, called on the government to introduce tax breaks for married couples "without delay". He said: "Apart from the UK only 18% of OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) citizens live in states which do not recognise marriage in their tax systems - and most of those 18% live in either Mexico or Turkey. In 2008-09, a single-earner married couple with two children and on the average wage bore a tax burden which was a third greater than the OECD average. The comparative figures for 2009-10 will show a further deterioration."

Crossbench peer Lord Sacks said only "political correctness" prevented people recognising that marriage was crucial for strong families and "in the best interest of the child". Focusing on the benefit of marriage for children, Lord Sacks, who has been Chief Rabbi since 1991, said: "If the Jewish experience has anything to say to Britain today, it is to recognise marriage, not just cohabitation, as in the best interests of the child. Do so in the tax system, do so in the educational system, do so in relationship support." He went on: "Without stable marriages we will not have strong families and without strong families we will not have a big society."

Towards the conclusion of the Bishop of Chester's speech, he reminded the House of the commitment to marriage made by the Prime Minister who said during Prime Ministers Questions: ‘I am an unashamed supporter of families and marriage, and I simply do not understand why, when so many other European countries ... recognise marriage in the tax system, we do not.'

A number of peers reminded the Government of its commitment to recognize marriage in tax system which can be found on page 30 of the Coalition Agreement. Peers also expressed concerns about the failure to make any reference to marriage in the new round of relationship support funding.

Chief executive of the couple and family relationships charity Relate, Baroness Tyler of Enfield made her maiden speech in the House of Lords on Thursday 10 February in a balloted debate on the role of marriage and marriage support in British society.

Declaring an interest in the debate as Relate’s chief executive, Baroness Tyler of Enfield said the charity, which ‘fully recognises the reality of modern-day relationships’, was ‘optimistic about the future of marriage as a strong public manifestation of commitment’ which works well for many people.

‘What matters most is the quality of a relationship, rather than its formal status,’ Baroness Tyler said. Discussing their attitude to marriage, child-rearing, work-life balance and, in-laws, prepared engaged couples for ‘inevitable bumps along the road.’ Couples needed to be aware of ‘these pressure points, to know what support is out there, and to be encouraged to seek it early before things reach a crisis point.’

A Hart report for this decade might ‘usefully investigate how best to incentivise people into accessing relationship education and support before they commit to a relationship, particularly before they have children, as well as when they start to hit problems. Some people are now using light-touch relationship support—perhaps a befriending or mentoring arrangement—simply to maintain or to strengthen their relationship. It is a bit like taking your car to the garage annually for an MoT or having a regular check-up with the dentist. I should like to see that become the norm,’ she said.

A new report should also look at local and national funding for relationship support. Many local charities, including Relate centres, were facing a grim future as local authorities finalised their budgets. ‘For me, it is a matter of profound social justice that relationship support is available to all our fellow citizens, particularly the most disadvantaged and those on low income. High-quality relationships—we might call them happy relationships—lead to the best outcomes for adults and children,’ Baroness Tyler said. ‘Supporting marriage and relationships should and must mean supporting happy marriages, and making sure that support is there for couples to help them get back on track when they need it most.’

The Minister responding on behalf of the Government, Lord Hill, welcomed the Debate and made positive comments, promising that the Government would push things forward in favour of marriage.

·         Mental health strategy fails to address family breakdown, says think tank

The Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) has criticised the government for failing to address the problem of family breakdown in its mental health strategy reports CYPNow (and the Daily Mail). In the report Mental Health: Poverty, Ethnicity and Family Breakdown, the think tank states that family breakdown is strongly associated with poor mental health in adults and children but has been overlooked in the government’s strategy. A poll of more than 1,000 people with experience of mental illness conducted as part of the study, found 50 per cent of respondents believe family breakdown is a major cause of poor mental health.

The report states: "Family breakdown and conflict were considered to have the biggest adverse impact on children’s wellbeing. Children with separated, single or step-parents are 50 per cent more likely to fail at school, have low self-esteem, experience poor peer relationships and have behavioural difficulties, anxiety or depression." The centre is now calling for treatment to be more focused on helping the whole family unit as a way of preventing mental illness among children....

Best wishes,

The 2-in-2-1 Team

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