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item0074B 1042, 1043 1042 29 November 2004
Pre-Nups?
The top UK family lawyers, the Solicitors' Family Law Association, want the Government to legislate for "pre-nuptial agreements" to be made legally binding. At the moment they are not: marriage is conceived as a matter of status, nor personal contract, and it is only the Courts that can regulate the consequences of its dissolution, as a matter of civic status. I am opposed to any such move, but I am aware that my opposition may seem illogical to some. After all, it is argued, consenting adults should be free to regulate these matters for themselves, in a liberal society. Are you not, Warren Evans, in favour of personal freedom? I consider that "marriage" should remain a common-status institution for the UK, clearly defined by society and understood by citizens and "celebrated" throughout society in common, in precisely same format. Everyone should know where they, and other married couples, stand. I believe that weaker spouses, of both sexes, are protected by this commonality of status, and spared from oppression by richer and more powerful spouses.The common bonds created by "UK marriage" should be clearly understood, as a matter of status. It should not be open to the parties concerned to re-write marriage law, by concluding an overriding contract, changing the ground-rules of marriage. I am content that, if a pre-marriage (i.e. prenuptial) contract has in fact been concluded, the divorce Court may look at it, in its search for a just solution. That already happens, as a matter of commonsense. But the Court is not constrained to give legal force to the pre-nup: if its terms are not fair and sensible, they can be ignored. If pre-nups were legally binding, that Court discretion would disappear. There would be far greater pressure on the weaker or poorer parties to enter into such agreements in the first place, to their detriment. And it is a fallacy to think that a consensual contract is a satisfactory way of regulating all personal matters. Contracts are very fragile arrangement, often inadequate to regulate long-term relationships. However good the lawyer, it is simply impossible to anticipate all the twists and turns of circumstance over (say) a twenty-five year period. With pre-nups, there is the awful risk of one party being caught in an out-of-date contract, unrelated to prevailing personal circumstances. In those circumstances it should be for the judge to find the just solution, without being constrained b by the dead letter of an old contract. Where do you stand on this matter? Drop me a line
1043 22 November 2004 Labour's
We are beset by an ice-age of authoritarianism. It is has been triggered by terrorism, but it is fed by Labour's insensitivity to the very concept of a "human right". Blair, Blunkett, Hoon, Straw and Falconer have all proved themselves to be wanting in any "liberal" dimension, and seem almost to revel in their thuggishness. The insidious and fallacious Blairite doctrine that rights must be balanced by "responsibilities" had given birth to a collectivist monster, the New Authoritarianism.
What do you think? Drop me a line
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I hardly thought that I would ever find myself agreeing
with Vanessa Redgrave, whom I have always considered a bit of a
lightweight and a crank, politically. But her perception, shared by her brother Corin, of Human Rights
as moving to the centre of the political stage chimes remarkably with mine.
They have founded a new political Party
(somewhat clumsily called Peace and Progress)
-