Gretna Green calls for reform to marriage process
Figures show fewer than half of UK adults are married.
For the first time, fewer than half of UK adults are married – sparking fears the institution of marriage could all but disappear within a generation.
There are now calls for the UK Government to appoint a Marriage Tsar – a national figurehead to lead reform of the UK’s outdated marriage laws, as new research reveals that while love and commitment remain strong, the process of getting married is turning people off tying the knot.
A YouGov study revealed just over a quarter of Brits support scrapping the statutory 28-day notice period - the mandatory wait between registering intent to marry and the ceremony itself.
New research by Gretna Green shows that the average time between getting engaged and tying the knot now stands at 15 months with one in five couples saying they had to wait over two years to get married.
Cost is the biggest obstacle, with over two-thirds citing financial pressures as the main reason for the delay, and one in ten pointing to legal or administrative hurdles that stand in the way of saying 'I do.'
Marriage applications still require handwritten forms and take twice as long to process as they did 15 years ago.
To address this, Gretna Green is leading a national campaign to reform the UK’s marriage laws, campaigning for modern, accessible, marriage legislation.
Gretna Green's Executive Chairman John Holliday said: "What we're calling for is making the process simpler, make it easier, it's 2025, not 1977.
"I got married in the 00s, and we saved for a year, but the process was simpler then. It took us 14 days then. Why is it 28 days in 2025.
"The only people that can change the law is the government.
"I believe this is the exactly the moment to start thinking about long term building blocks for a stable society. Marriage is a tradition, a social tradition, there's lots of benefits.
"It's not a distraction, it's the foundation of modern society.
"It's at a tipping point at the moment though. For the first time in history there are fewer people that are married than unmarried.
"There's three reasons. The first one is cost. The average cost of a wedding is £23,000 in the UK. That's staggering. Arguably, are we pushing people away with cost pressures like that, though here it's only £2,000 on average.
"Number 2, process, to get married in the UK it takes a staggering 28 days. 10 years ago it's half that time. Comparibaly, Denmark it can take 5 days, Germany, 2 weeks, America can take between 1 and 3 days.
"We're the laggard. It's an anologue process in a digital world. It's easier to get a mortgage, it's easier and quicker to get a passport, and most tellingly, it's easier and quicker to get divorced than it is married when it comes to process.
"There's something wrong with that."
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: "The Government remains committed to marriage as one of our most important institutions."