Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Bill

House of Commons, 25 February 2022.

Lindsay Hoyle (Speaker, Chorley)

Before we get to proceedings, I remind Members of the difference between Report and Third Reading. The scope of the debate on Report is the amendments that I have selected; the scope of the Third Reading debate to follow will be the whole Bill as it stands after Report. Members may wish to consider those points and then decide at which stage or stages they want to try to catch my eye.

Clause 2 - Offence of conduct relating to marriage of persons under 18

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

I beg to move amendment 1, page 1, line 11, leave out “(2)” and insert “(3)”

This amendment would insert the subsection which provides for the new offence of carrying out conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage after section 121(3) of the Anti-social Behaviour, Policing and Crime Act 2014 rather than after section 121(2) of that Act.

Lindsay Hoyle (Speaker, Chorley)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 2, page 1, line 15, leave out “threats or any other form or coercion” and insert “threats, any other form of coercion or deception, and whether or not it is carried out in England and Wales”.

This amendment would state expressly that for the new offence of carrying out conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage, the conduct may take place in England and Wales or elsewhere and may, but does not have to, involve deception.

Amendment 3, page 1, line 17, leave out subsection (3).

This amendment would remove the cross-reference to the new offence of carrying out conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage.

Amendment 4, page 2, line 3, leave out subsection (6) and insert—

‘(6) After subsection (7) insert—

“(7A) A person commits an offence under subsection (3A) only if—

(a) the conduct is for the purpose of causing the child to enter into a marriage in England or Wales,

(b) at the time of the conduct, the person or child is habitually resident in England and Wales, or

(i) has been habitually resident in England and Wales, and

(ii) is not habitually resident or domiciled in Scotland or Northern Ireland.”’

This amendment would mean that a person may commit the new offence of carrying out conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage only if the conduct is for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage in England or Wales, or the person or the child has a specified connection to England and Wales.

Amendment 5, page 2, line 4s, leave out subsection (7).

This amendment would in respect of the new offence of carrying out conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage remove the exception for marriages of 16 and 17 year olds that take place in Scotland or Northern Ireland, so that conduct related to such marriages may amount to an offence.

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

I am pleased to speak to these amendments, which I am confident will make the Bill clearer and cleaner, and provide more effective, targeted and proportionate safeguarding. Before I come to the details of the amendments, I remind hon. Members of the purpose of clause 2, to which all five amendments relate.

Clause 2 will create a new part of the forced marriage offence within the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. Currently, it is only an offence to cause a child to marry if violence, threats or another form of coercion are used, or if the child lacks capacity to consent to marry under the Mental Health Capacity Act 2005. It is not an offence to cause a child to marry if coercion is not used and the child is not covered by that Act. As I set out on Second Reading in November, this is a real loophole. To ensure that all children are protected, the Bill needs to ensure that it is always an offence to cause a child under the age of 18 to enter into a marriage, whatever the methods used.

I propose to start by going through the first three broadly technical amendments, beginning with amendment 3. The existing offence of forced marriage contains a subsidiary offence of deceiving someone into going overseas with the aim of forcing them into marriage there. That is an important addition, because such behaviour is far from uncommon. As it stands, the Bill expressly extends that deception offence to encompass the behaviour entailed in the new offence. However, on reflection, Ministers and I feel that it is not necessary. The new offence that we are adding, of causing a child to marry, refers to

“any conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage before the child’s eighteenth birthday, whether or not the conduct amounts to violence, threats or another form of coercion.”

That would include deceiving a child into going overseas. That means that the provision in the original Bill is unnecessary duplication, and it makes the law less clear than it could and should be. Amendment 3 would remove the express extension of the deception offence to cover the conduct entailed in the new offence of causing a child to marry. I would like to put beyond doubt, on the record, that that new offence does include deceiving a child, be that into going overseas or otherwise.

To reinforce this, amendment 2 adds specific reference to “deception” as one of the types of conduct that it might encompass, as well as specifying that it does not matter whether or not the conduct was carried out in England and Wales. Finally, and purely consequentially, amendment 1 merely moves the new offence of causing a child to marry from before the deception offence to after it, where it more naturally fits.

Amendments 4 and 5 make substantive changes to the nature of the offence, in such a way, I believe, as to improve the Bill. They relate to the jurisdictional scope of the offence—the scenarios that can lead to prosecution, based on where the parties are, where they live, what their nationalities are, and where the marriage is to take place. Currently, the new offence of causing a child to marry essentially inherits the jurisdictional scope of the existing forced marriage offence. It also required a carve-out provision—clause 2(7) of the original Bill—which removed liability where marriages of 16 and 17-year-olds take place in Scotland or Northern Ireland. Hon. Members will be aware that that was necessary because marriage policy is devolved and the age of marriage is different in those countries.

On reflection with Ministers, that presented two problems. First, those wishing to carry out a child marriage in England or Wales would, in many cases, have been able to get around the offence simply by having the marriage take place in Scotland or Northern Ireland—I refer to that as the “Gretna Green” exception. Secondly, the law as drafted would inadvertently include UK nationals resident in Scotland, and Northern Ireland residents who, perfectly legally under their own law and under the law of another country, wished to marry at 16 or 17 in that third country. That could be seen as a lack of respect for the devolution settlement. It is evidently not appropriate for the law to reach that far, but on the other hand, we would like to close the Gretna Green loophole. I am therefore grateful to Ministers for their help and support in reaching a solution that both respects the devolution settlement and removes that dangerous loophole.

Amendment 5, which is the first part of the solution, removes the current exemption in clause 2(7) for marriages of 16 and 17-year-olds taking place in Scotland and Northern Ireland. That will remove the Gretna Green exception. However, the offence would then cover all UK nationals marrying overseas, which could include those living in or domiciled in Scotland or Northern Ireland, where child marriage is—unfortunately—still legal. Amendment 4 will therefore make the jurisdictional provisions more proportionate and targeted while still ensuring maximum safeguarding. That will provide that a person can be prosecuted in one of three situations.

Richard Holden (Conservative, North West Durham)

Will my hon. Friend, like me, welcome the fact that Northern Ireland is consulting on raising the minimum age of marriage to 18? Will she join me in expressing a desire that the Scottish Government should reflect on that and do the same?

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Northern Ireland is consulting, and I think that Scotland is about to do so. That is so important, because, if they do not change, they will not reflect the sustainable development goals that they have signed up to along with us. If they want to abide by those goals, they will have to move forward on that. I look forward to us being one nation all doing the same thing. I thank him for that point.

The first situation is if a marriage is to take place in England or Wales. It can never be right for us to allow the marriage of a child to happen within our borders. The second situation is if the perpetrator or victim is habitually resident—they ordinarily live—in England and Wales. That will ensure that we protect children who live in this country and that those people who live here obey our rules and norms. The final situation is if the child is a UK national who has been habitually resident in England or Wales and who is neither habitually resident nor domiciled in Scotland or Northern Ireland. Domiciled is a slightly different concept from habitual residence: it means the place that someone regards as their permanent home, even if they are actually living somewhere else. So, all UK nationals who have at some point lived in England or Wales, unless they live in or have their permanent home in Scotland or Northern Ireland, will be covered.

One of the effects of those changes is, as I indicated, to show respect for the devolution settlement in a more effective and meaningful way than the Bill does currently. The offence would no longer encompass situations where a parent arranges for their 16 or 17-year-old UK national child who lives in Scotland or Northern Ireland to marry outside the UK, so it would not stop such Scottish or Northern Irish children from exercising the rights under the laws of those countries.

We did consider removing the UK national criteria of the offence in its entirety, but that would mean that, when it came to marriages happening outside England and Wales, we would have had to rely solely on habitual residence, which is a fluid property that can be lost if a person has sufficiently severed their ties with England and Wales. The Girls Not Brides UK coalition, who are experts in this area, were concerned that that could cause perverse behaviour, namely that parents might keep their children overseas before causing them to marry until such time as they lost their habitual residence and, therefore, the protection of the law.

We have therefore kept the UK national criteria, but only for a child who has been habitually resident in England and Wales at some point in their life, to ensure intervention in matters overseas only if there is a reasonable connection to England and Wales. Out of respect for the devolution settlement, the offence would apply only if the child were not at that time habitually resident or domiciled in Scotland or Northern Ireland.

The amendments will create a more rounded and focused regime. As such, I commend them to the House.

Rachel Maclean (Conservative, Redditch)

I am delighted to respond to my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham), both for her continued steerage of this vital Bill and for tabling these important amendments. It will not be me who responds to the final stage of the Bill, so, if I may, I will put on record my appreciation, and that of the entire House and I think the whole country, for the work she has done over her whole parliamentary career.

My hon. Friend has been assisted by a number of charities—I believe some are in the Gallery or elsewhere in the House today—and I want to thank them for all the work they have put in. It has been an extremely complex piece of legislation but, together with the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove), we have all worked together to navigate through those difficulties. I am also very grateful to Home Office and Ministry of Justice officials, who put in considerable time and effort. We now have a Bill, with the amendments, that will properly protect vulnerable children—very often girls and mostly young girls—who have, unfortunately, suffered the experience of being coerced into marriage without the use of force. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire, I believe that no child should be in a position to be contracting a marriage under the age of 18.

As my hon. Friend set out in her speech, amendments 1 to 3 are minor and technical, and essentially address a duplication in the Bill as it stands. The new offence, which clause 2(2) introduces, would make it illegal to carry out any conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage. Any conduct includes deceiving a child into going overseas for marriage, so we do not need the separate provision for that which clause 2(3) would make. The amendments would therefore remove that duplication, and are in the interests of making legislation which is as clear as it can be to everyone. They also make it clear that the new offence of causing a child to enter into a marriage does include deceiving the child, whether or not that relates to going overseas, although it does not have to include deception.

Amendments 4 and 5 are more substantive and relate to the jurisdictional impact—the territorial reach, if you like—of that new behaviour of causing a child to marry even if coercion is not used. At the moment the jurisdictional provisions for that behaviour mirror those in the existing forced marriage offence: namely that prosecution may occur when the perpetrator and/or the victim is physically present in England and Wales, or if at least one of them is habitually resident in England and Wales, or if both of them are outside the UK and at least one of them is a UK national. The sole exception is that marriages of 16 and 17-year-olds in Scotland and Northern Ireland would never be covered. Let me agree with my hon. Friend in her hope that we see our United Kingdom coming together as one to abide by our commitments to the sustainable development goals to safeguard more young girls from this frankly abhorrent practice of marrying a child before they are ready to do so.

Amendment 5 would remove that exception relating to marriages of 16 and 17-year-olds in Northern Ireland and Scotland. While we made that provision in recognition of the devolution settlement, we came to judge that the potential impact on enforcement was too great. There are too many circumstances in which a parent could evade the law by taking their child to Scotland or Northern Ireland to marry, even if there were no connection with either of those two countries. My hon. Friend has done an extremely good job in setting out clearly the multiple number of scenarios that could apply. I believe that the Bill, once the amendments are agreed to, will have that targeted and proportionate effect.

We also took the view that there were better and more effective ways of respecting the devolution settlement, and that is where amendment 4 comes in. The amendment would replace existing jurisdictional provisions for the new offence of causing a child to marry with provisions that state that a prosecution may occur if the marriage was to take place in England or Wales, or if at least one of the victim or the perpetrator is habitually resident in England or Wales, or if the victim is a UK national who has at some point been habitually resident in England or Wales and is also neither habitually resident nor domiciled in Scotland or Northern Ireland.

Taken together, this will ensure that the law extends only to those circumstances where there is a proper connection to England or Wales and not to, for example, UK national children who live in Scotland and marry overseas or UK national children who live and have always lived overseas. The amendments would therefore ensure, for example, that a parent who lives in England could not take their 16-year-old child who also lives in England to Scotland for a traditional ceremonial marriage merely to get around the law, but also that, where a 17-year-old child lives in Scotland and the parent does not live in England or Wales, there is no bar to their seeking to arrange for the child to marry outside the UK. Likewise, if a parent who was a UK national but lived, for example, in Austria arranged for their 17-year-old child, who also lived in Austria and was not even a UK national, to marry in, say, Salzburg, they will now not be caught by this law.

All in all, these amendments make for a Bill that is better targeted, provides more effective safeguarding, is more proportionate and ensures that ultimately, as my hon. Friend said, we capture the people who we want to capture and not those who we do not. Before I conclude, may I once again say a tremendous thank you to my hon. Friend? I commend her for this incredible piece of campaigning work, which she has steered through the parliamentary procedures with admirable determination and drive. It is a tribute to her passion for safeguarding and protecting young girls. I am absolutely inspired by the work she has done. These amendments will make for a more effective Bill, and I confirm the Government’s wholehearted support for them.

Amendment 1 agreed to.

Amendments made: 2, page 1, line 15, leave out “threats or any other form or coercion” and insert “threats, any other form of coercion or deception, and whether or not it is carried out in England and Wales”.

Amendment 3, page 1, line 17, leave out subsection (3).

This amendment would remove the cross-reference to the new offence of carrying out conduct for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage.

Amendment 4, page 2, line 3, leave out subsection (6) and insert—

“(6) After subsection (7) insert—

“(7A) A person commits an offence under subsection (3A) only if—

(a) the conduct is for the purpose of causing the child to enter into a marriage in England or Wales,

(b) at the time of the conduct, the person or child is habitually resident in England and Wales, or

(i) has been habitually resident in England and Wales, and

(ii) is not habitually resident or domiciled in Scotland or Northern Ireland.””

Amendment 5, page 2, line 4, leave out subsection (7). —(Mrs Pauline Latham.)

Third Reading

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

May I begin by thanking the Public Bill Committee, which met on 12 January to consider the Bill in detail? The Committee submitted the Bill to detailed scrutiny, and I am confident that the cross-party spirit that has run throughout this process has made it a much better piece of legislation.

After Second Reading in this House on 19 November last year, I was inundated with media and interview requests to talk about child marriage. Many of the issues and specific cases that hon. and right hon. Members from across the House raised were ones that there is not enough awareness of. Indeed, I am absolutely delighted that two of the incredibly brave survivors of child marriage whose stories I told in November, Payzee Mahmod and Farhana Raval, are here today in the Gallery to witness this historic moment, when the House of Commons will vote to end child marriage in this country.

Child marriage exists as both a legal and a social phenomenon. We in this House can, and I hope that we will, change the legal position by criminalising those who arrange child marriages and refusing to recognise unions involving children. However, the social aspect—raising awareness of child marriage among children, parents, educators, social care professionals and community leaders—is equally important. We must send a message that child marriage is illegal and is unacceptable under any circumstances.

Sajid Javid (Conservative, Bromsgrove)

May I take this opportunity to commend my hon. Friend for her tireless campaigning on this most important of issues? She has shown hon. Members and the public exactly why child marriage is child abuse and why it is absolutely right that we put an end to it.

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

I thank my right hon. Friend for that, and he is absolutely right. I know that he, too, has been passionate about raising awareness about this issue. If it were not for his now being Health Secretary, I would not be doing this today, because he had the private Member’s Bill, which I never got, and he generously gave it over to me. He did that because he knew that I had been working with the charities represented in the Public Gallery for many years. So I thank him for the help he has given in my being able to do this.

It is undeniable that changing this law and making it unequivocally clear that it will be illegal to arrange any child marriage, whether for a boy or a girl, in England and Wales, irrespective of alleged consent, coercion or persuasion, is a huge step in the right direction, because many children are brought up to believe that this is the norm, but it is not the norm in this country to be married as a child. This legislation will send a huge message out and that is the purpose of the Bill. Let me briefly mention the effect of each of its key provisions. First, the Bill will remove the exception that currently allows 16 and 17-year-olds to get married and to enter into a civil partnership with parental or judicial consent in England and Wales. People who are too young to consent for themselves are too young to be married. Getting married is a huge decision, no matter at what age someone decides to marry. The existing law has been in place for more than 70 years and reflects social values from a different time, one in which a school leaving age was 14 and the average age for marriage was just 23. Many girls like my mother left school at 14 and went to work. In that context, a marriage at 16 was not unreasonable. Of course, there were many shotgun weddings before the age of 18 where a pregnancy was involved, because in the eyes of many being pregnant without being married was a sin. This was before contraception and life is completely different now.

Now, the Government have legislated to ensure that all children must be in education or training until 18, providing greater opportunities for academic and professional development for all children. Furthermore, the average age for marriage is now over 30. There are substantially fewer than 200 children utilising this exception every year, which is evidence that as a society we are moving away from this practice. So there is a real need to remove that exception. When I have tried to bring this before the House previously, I have been told by previous Ministers, not the excellent Ministers we have in place today, that it was not relevant, because there were so few cases and it did not really matter.

Richard Holden (Conservative, North West Durham)

My hon. Friend says that it is the children using this exemption, but in Committee, where I supported her, she made the point powerfully that it is not children using the exemption, but their family members, who are seeking to pressurise them into marriage. That entirely shows the point of this piece of legislation.

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

My hon. Friend is right: this is about coercion, persuasion and accepting that this is the norm in a family. It is not the norm, and should not be, in this country. If a child is unable to sign that piece of paper to say that they are getting married, they are too young to have somebody else do it for them, and to persuade them and make them get married at that stage. So this Bill is very, very important. The impact on those children who wish to take advantage of the exception will be minimal. They will only have to wait a maximum of two years to marry; if they are 16 and a half, it will be only 18 months. So we are talking about only a very short time, although I do accept that when someone is 16, two years seems a very long time—in reality, as all know in this Chamber, that is not true. The impact on victims of child marriage around the world of England and Wales setting its legal aid of marriage unambiguously at 18 will be enormous.

The second key provision will make it a crime to organise any unregistered marriage involving a child in England and Wales. This is a huge part of the problem we are trying to solve. As I set out on Second Reading, the cases of child marriage in the UK that cause the most concern often do not show up in the statistics. Of the cases involving potential child marriage reported to the Home Office-commissioned national honour- based abuse helpline, delivered by Karma Nirvana—representatives of which are in the Gallery today—in the year to September 2021, only four related to civil marriages. There are almost 20 times as many cases that involve only a religious ceremony—more than 95% of all cases—and those are the people who go to Karma Nirvana for help, so Members can imagine how many do not do that and are persuaded to be married.

We know from the experiences of Payzee—who is also in the Gallery—among many others that the religious ceremony is the most important part of the marriage in the eyes of the family and the community of the child. They do not need the registered part: they are not interested in that. It is the unregistered part that makes the difference for them, and currently, there is no age limit on an unregistered marriage. The only requirement is that it is not forced, and we know that under the current law, proving a forced marriage where it involves children is extremely difficult. The Girls Not Brides UK coalition, which has done so much in the campaign to end child marriage, has been involved in shocking cases where the child being married was under 10 years old.

Therefore, my second key provision updates forced marriage legislation to create a new offence of arranging the marriage of a child. This offence will be triggered by any conduct that causes a child under 18 to enter into such a marriage, whether civil or religious. Crucially, unlike with forced marriage, there is no need to prove coercion or control. This takes the onus away from the child to show that their marriage was forced, and will make prosecutions easier and the deterrent that much stronger. I should make it absolutely clear that this criminal offence is not about criminalising the child. The child is the victim in every single case; the criminals are the adults who organised these marriages.

A key provision that I would like to highlight is the provision of extraterritoriality. The Girls Not Brides UK coalition, as well as the Government’s forced marriage unit, have seen plenty of evidence to suggest that very often children who live in the United Kingdom are being taken abroad, often to a country where extended family live, in order to be married. Sometimes, they are taken abroad for just a few weeks, but sometimes they are taken abroad for many months or years—as in the case of Farhana, who is also in the Gallery today. It is crucial that the offence captures that conduct, because it is just as damaging to the future prospects and life chances of the victims as a marriage that takes place in the United Kingdom. If a child is out of education for months or even years, they will find it much harder to enter the workplace and become economically productive, if they ever do so.

I have been working very hard with the Government since the Committee stage to ensure that the Bill is comprehensive and covers as many situations as possible. My thanks go to the Ministers and the teams of officials who have worked so hard to get it right, resulting in the amendments on Report. I did not want to come back next year or the year after with more amendments; I wanted the Bill to be right from the start, because loopholes need to be closed. Therefore, I am delighted that this Bill will cover not just marriages taking place in England and Wales, but marriages anywhere in the world involving a child or a person who lives in England or Wales, as well as those involving UK national children who have at any point lived in England or Wales. That offers a huge amount of protection to all children growing up in this country, and removes any incentive for parents to leave the UK in order to avoid our marriage law.

Having considered the Bill’s key provisions, I shall briefly reflect on its importance. Primarily, the Bill is important because it will offer protection from marriage to every single child who grows up in England and Wales, forever. At a stroke, it will stop both registered and unregistered marriages under the age of 18 and ensure that this protection cannot be avoided simply by someone temporarily leaving the country. I often talk about safeguarding futures, because that is what we are doing: safeguarding children’s futures so that they can have decent lives.

Child marriage is so harmful to the future prospects of the victims and almost always results in their leaving education, thereby reducing their career prospects and overall life chances. Before I came to this place, my political background was in education, which I firmly believe is the most powerful tool we have to create opportunities for young people. It is an enormous disadvantage if young people are deprived of education—an education that we in this House have determined to provide up until the age of 18—because of child marriage.

It is not an understatement to say that the Bill will protect and affect the lives of literally millions of young boys and girls in this country. It will protect them from child marriage and enable them to have the best chance in life, because they will be able to continue in education until the age of 18. It will also strengthen their ability to say to their parents, “I want to go to university” or get an apprenticeship or a job. It will be much easier, because at 16 a young person is totally dependent on their parents and cannot live independently.

The legislation’s implications will be felt not just in the UK. The UK is committed to achieving the UN’s sustainable development goals, target 5.3 of which is to

“eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilations”

before 2030. This applies specifically both to religious and to non-religious child marriages. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child recommends that there should be no legal way for anyone to marry under the age of 18. The Bill will therefore also help the UK to set an example to the rest of the world by prioritising children’s futures. The UK will finally be in a position to take a lead on child marriage around the world and on championing children’s futures. To be able to persuade other countries of the importance of banning child marriage, we must first ban it ourselves. When we have said to countries, “You need to raise the age of marriage,” they have come back to us and said, “Why should we? You don’t—you allow children to marry.”

I have set out the main provisions of my Bill and the enormous impact it will have on children in this country and around the world. Before I conclude, I wish to make an appeal to the Government. I thank the Minister, my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Corby, and his colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch, who has also worked closely with us on the Bill, for their patience and shared determination that the Bill should be as comprehensive and effective as possible. I am sure, though, that it will come as no surprise to the Minister that I have three final asks of the Government.

First, I impress on the Minister the importance of the Bill’s swift commencement. Clause 7 confirms that the Bill will come into force on the day appointed by the Secretary of State. However, every day before commencement is another day on which child marriage remains possible in this country. Will the Minister please do everything in his power to arrange for commencement to take place as swiftly as possible? In particular, will the Minister give his view on whether, should the Bill make good progress through the other place and pass into law, a commencement before the summer holidays is possible? So many children are taken abroad in the summer and I fear we will be failing in our duties in this place if we do not offer them the protection this summer that we in this House believe is necessary.

Secondly, as I mentioned at the start of my speech, changing the law is only one part of the solution. Changing attitudes and societal norms is the second stage, and I have already raised that with the Department for Education. Will the Minister please confirm that he will work closely with the Department to ensure that both children and teachers are informed about the change in the law in advance of the summer holidays, so that children who are at risk can be spotted? Not only schools will need updated guidance. Will the Minister also please confirm that updated guidance for the police and for the Crown Prosecution Service will be swiftly produced to help in the investigation and prosecution of crimes under this legislation?

Finally, but no less importantly, I would like to note one final point, which is one I regret. Unfortunately, due to marriage policy being devolved, the protections in this Bill extend only to children in England and Wales, or to children with a specific connection to England and Wales. At the moment, the Scottish Government and the Northern Ireland Executive do not have equivalent legislation, so children there will not be safeguarded. They also prevent the UK from completing its international obligations to end child marriage.

However, there are signs of change. The Northern Ireland Executive have launched a consultation on changing their marriage laws, and I hope that the Scottish Government will do the same. Will the Minister join me in a determined lobbying campaign to ensure that our colleagues in the devolved Administrations do the right thing and ban child marriage in their jurisdictions, too? I would be absolutely delighted if, in two years’ time, we were once again debating child marriage in this House to celebrate Scotland and Northern Ireland implementing similar pieces of legislation, so that all UK children would be covered and we would then be able to take out those provisions in this Bill.

In conclusion, I urge all hon. and right hon. Members to support my Bill. It will safeguard young people by establishing 18 as the legal age of marriage in this country, with no exceptions, giving a clear message to all that child marriage is totally unacceptable. Secondly, it criminalises anyone who causes a child to enter a marriage, offering protection from child marriage to all children growing up in England and Wales—a protection that applies both in this country and around the world.

Finally, the Bill helps the UK on its way to living up to its international obligations by banning child marriage in all its forms, and encourages the Scottish Government and the Northern Ireland Executive to follow suit. The Bill has the potential to impact millions of young people, and to prevent untold numbers entering into miserable child marriages. For the sake of children growing up now and yet to come, I commend the Bill to the House.

Virendra Sharma (Labour, Ealing, Southall)

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for calling me to speak on such an important Bill. I feel proud and privileged to be speaking here this morning and supporting the Bill.

I thank the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) for her tireless work in taking this Bill through Parliament. Her passion was evident in her powerful speech this morning. She has been tireless in her fight and deserves praise from all of us. I also want to register my thanks to the right hon. Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid), who is no longer in his place, who began this journey for us before his return to the Cabinet. Indeed, I thank all fellow sponsors of this Bill, and all Members here supporting this important legislation.

Child marriage is not a thing of the past, but it should be. It is something that harms everyone—boys and girls, parents and children. It makes young girls into a commodity to be bought and sold. They are made to be women long before they are anything but children.

Marriage at 16 is a hangover from a different age, and it is right that we now step forward to close this loophole. We do so because it is the right thing to do. We do so because not to act risks consigning thousands more girls to abuse and controlling marriages, and because to act will empower thousands each year to seek education and employment for their own and indeed everyone’s good. The single biggest step that we could take today to invigorate the economy around the world is the economic empowerment of women.

Child marriage is outlawed in many countries around the world. It shames us that we lend some tacit approval to its continuation by allowing marriage at 16 here. We can lead by example, and live up to what we say abroad. We can slap down charges of hypocrisy by acting for ourselves and reaffirming our commitment to childhood.

Child marriage is often just another form of coercive control and abuse. Sadly, too often it is perpetrated by parents and siblings to force young women and girls into outdated behaviour owing to a misplaced and frankly heinous sense of so-called honour. The horrific murder of Banaz Mahmod in 2006, and the testimony of those who actually cared about her, including her sister Payzee Mahmod, show that honour and love have nothing to do with so-called honour killings and child marriage.

As a member of Ealing Council, I was proud to support the organisation Southall Black Sisters by providing their first official funding, because the work that they do matters. Sadly, that work is as necessary now as it was then. Not all child marriage is about abuse, and I know that some end in happy marriage, but that choice should be made by an adult for themselves, not forced on a child.

I must now share my personal family experience. My own mother, the late Ram Piary Sharma, married young, at only 14, and had her first child shortly after her 17th birthday. She had already brought one life into the world, and she was still a girl—a child. She was bright, intelligent, interested and driven, but poorly educated. Education was something that she insisted on delivering for her own daughters when life had denied it to her. She took the extraordinary step of starting a small school for girls in our village. While there had for many years been opportunities for boys to study, there was nowhere in my village, Mandhali, for a girl to learn. My mother secured a small room, hired a teacher from the next village to come and teach girls, and Bimla, my sister, was the first pupil. It was a great success, and soon many of our friends and neighbours were sending their girls too. My sister was the first to matriculate, and eventually went into further education, followed by my other three sisters. My mother put such value on learning and education, and it changed so many lives. Bimla trained to become a teacher and came back to Mandhali to teach another generation of girls, to change lives and make a difference, all because of the opportunities that not marrying young gave her.

My other three sisters also went into professional jobs, and none married young—they all married after the age of 22. My mother ensured that they knew the value of their learning and their responsibility to live the best life they could. That is the opportunity banning child marriage offers: the ability to shape lives for the better. Banning child marriage is not a ban on love and it is not state control; it protects the right to childhood, the right to a decent education and the right to a brighter future.

I feel honoured to participate in this debate.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

Very moving.

Louie French (Conservative, Old Bexley and Sidcup)

I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) for this Bill and for her tireless work and efforts to protect children and end child marriage. It is no surprise that this Bill has received cross-party and Government support, which reflects her thorough and attentive approach, alongside the strong necessity to update this area of law.

As my hon. Friend outlined, the Bill seeks to raise the minimum age of marriage and civil partnerships from 16 to 18 in England and Wales, which will bring an end to provisions allowing for 16 and 17-year-olds to marry or enter a civil partnership with parental or judicial consent. This Bill will also make it illegal for a person to arrange the marriage of another person under the age of 18 in England and Wales in those circumstances where it is not already illegal.

At the age of 16, a person cannot get a tattoo, vote, drive or buy alcohol. Most importantly, they are defined as a child under both the UN convention on the rights of the child and the Children Act 1989. A marriage or civil partnership is a lifelong commitment with significant legal and financial implications, and this Bill will allow girls and boys more time to grow, to be educated and to mature before making this serious commitment so that they can decide their own future.

At the grand old age of 34, I am still young enough to remember some of the mistakes I made at the age of 16 and 17, and they were not limited to my choice of clothes or haircut—some might argue that neither has improved. I could not fathom entering a marriage at the age of 16 or 17, nor having the maturity to make such a major decision when my experience of the world was so limited.

In discussing marriage today, this is certainly not the first time I have reflected on my life journey compared with that of my parents and grandparents. When I look at old family photos, often hiding in a dusty cupboard rather than in the cloud or on Facebook, I am always amazed at how young they look in their wedding photos. That is a reflection of how much times have changed even within my generation and my parents’ generation, let alone since these laws were originally made back in 1929.

I welcome the comprehensiveness of the Bill in closing the loopholes on child marriage and removing the significant barriers to protection and safeguarding in child marriage cases. The existing law covers cases where a parent or other third party uses violence, threats or another form of coercion to cause a child to enter into a marriage, and my understanding is that this does not cover situations where a child is caused to enter into a marriage where coercion is not used. This Bill closes that loophole by making it an offence to cause an under-18 to enter into marriage in any circumstances.

I also welcome that the Bill not only removes the parental consent exception but covers both civil and unregistered religious ceremonies, which are often the main source of child marriages, as we have heard. This helps to fulfil the safeguarding aim of the Bill, as the life-changing consequences of marriage are derived not only from the legal procedure but from the traditional or religious aspects, which are regarded as just as much as marriage by the parties, their families and their communities.

Again, I thank my hon. Friend and all the charities involved for shining a spotlight on this issue. It is also so important and significant that this Bill includes marriages that do not take place in this country as long as the child is a UK national and resident in England or Wales. Far too often, we see in the media extreme examples of outdated cultural practices of children being married to fully grown adults in foreign countries, and this Bill helps to protect children in both England and Wales. I hope—it is my sincere hope—that Scotland and Northern Ireland follow suit and we can protect all UK children.

I commend the holistic coverage of this Bill in closing those loopholes. I believe this to be a reflection of my hon. Friend’s years of focused work on the Bill and of the thorough manner with which she has steered it through the House, including by working closely with charities, Ministers and schools on its intent and provisions, which really get to the crux of the issue.

One of the main reasons I entered politics was to ensure that children are given the best chance in life, particularly through education and better opportunities. That is why I fully support the Bill. Throughout the pandemic, we have seen that the classroom really is the best place for our children—not only for learning, but for their safeguarding, mental health and wellbeing. The teachers and schools of Old Bexley and Sidcup do a remarkable job of giving local children the best life chances, and they rightly remain a source of local pride.

I am pleased that the Bill strengthens the safeguarding of children, because too often teachers spot the signs of child marriage, but unfortunately the police are unable to take any further action due to the parental consent given, the marriage not being legally binding or its not taking place in England or Wales. This is the perfect example of how the Bill gets to the heart of the issue and tackles all forms of child marriage.

I welcome the fact that evidence has shown that the number of people marrying at 16 and 17 in England and Wales has been in decline over the years. In 2016, there were 153 marriages involving 16 and 17-year-olds, which went down to 125 in 2019. Despite that decline, more needs to be done because every single child matters and deserves such protection, particularly as, unfortunately, child marriage is often a mechanism for abuse, as we have heard. Marriages under 18 often lead to a lack of education and job opportunities, physical and mental health problems, a loss of independence and an increased risk of domestic abuse.

While child marriage can impact on both girls and boys, the issue overwhelmingly affects girls, with 80% of those who married as children in 2019 being girls. I am proud that this Government are leading the way in protecting girls and women globally, including by making international commitments to end child marriage. This Bill will ensure that our country leads by example to eradicate the practice worldwide. As part of the UK’s world-leading efforts in tackling violence against women and girls—an agenda to which I am fully committed—the UK Government have announced £18 million of new UK funding to end child marriage, through partners at UNICEF and the United Nations Population Fund, and to benefit women and girls in 12 countries, including Sierra Leone, Uganda, Ethiopia, Bangladesh and Yemen.

As a nation we must continue to champion and promote girls’ education around the world, and I believe that this Bill complements that aim for the reasons outlined earlier, including, unfortunately, that one of the main consequences of child marriage is a lack of education. I therefore welcome the fact that this Bill will align our domestic and foreign policy, and help us in our goal to end child marriage and promote girls’ education around the world.

I fully support this Bill and herald it as a landmark piece of legislation that delivers significant social reform, provides a huge step forward in preventing child abuse, and allows the UK to continue to lead by example in protecting children, particularly girls, and women globally as well as here in the UK. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who has campaigned with such tenacity on this important issue and worked so hard to ensure that the Bill satisfies the overarching policy objectives so well.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

Order. Mr Speaker will come in just before 11 am for the urgent question. Whoever is on their feet at 11 am will be asked to resume their seat for the urgent question, and afterwards they can continue their speech, so do not be surprised by that if you are on your feet at that time.

Darren Henry (Conservative, Broxtowe)

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) for introducing the Bill and allowing me to be part of this debate. The Bill seeks to bring laws on marriage into the 21st century. As my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr French) pointed out, this is an issue that overwhelmingly affects women and girls, with 80% of under-age marriages in 2018 being undertaken by girls. It should be made clear that the introduction of the Bill is not about removing choice: it is about essential protections for children.

The Bill seeks not only to make marriage illegal for under-18-year-olds, but to create an offence for anyone to arrange the marriage of a person under the age of 18. The commitment of a marriage or civil partnership is not one that anyone should enter into lightly or without full knowledge and consent. Child marriage happens across countries, cultures, religions and ethnicities. It happens all around the world, but in this debate it is essential that we address the fact that many such marriages are created out of coercion.

Forced marriages are illegal in the UK, however when a person under the age of 18 is pressured to get married, research has shown that it is often by a family member. Reports show that young people in those situations do not merely lack the resources to report coercion but are often put in the impossible position of having to report on a parent or loved one. That can leave young girls of 16 faced with a choice between sending a parent to prison and being forced to marry. Other repercussions reported by survivors include being ostracised by their families and even communities. No child should be put in that position, and the Bill will take us one step closer to ensuring that no child will have to make that choice.

Child marriage has also been shown to be strongly linked to female genital mutilation, the practice of the cutting or removal of some or all of the external female genitalia. Female genital mutilation is growing every year in this country and we must be clear that it is not a cultural practice and has nothing to do with ethnicity or religion. As mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, who is no longer in his place, it is a form of child abuse, and it should not be treated as anything less. Social stigma is often the reason the practice continues, and that must be tackled in our schools and local communities.

UNICEF estimates that 720 million women alive today were married when they were children. Research by Girls Not Brides has shown that every year 12 million girls are married before the age of 18. That amounts to 23 girls every minute, or one nearly every three seconds. The UK should rightly be proud of our record in supporting and championing the rights of women and girls at home and abroad. For years we have fought to end child marriage in other countries, and in fact the UK has signed two international human rights conventions demanding that child marriage be ended in signatories’ jurisdictions. However, how can we continue to advocate so passionately for the end of the practice when we still have loopholes in our own law that allow under-18-year-olds to marry? It is vital that we demonstrate that a child marriage is not accepted in the UK, and we will do so through the Bill.

Studies are clear: under-age marriage has been shown to lead to lower education and employment opportunities, an increase in mental health problems and a higher incidence of domestic violence. During the covid-19 pandemic, it was reported that cases of child marriage were on the rise. Children were not in school and therefore were less able to access support, which meant that it was far harder for schools and communities to provide that support. We have a duty of care in this country to protect our children. As a father, I cannot imagine how I would feel if a child of mine were in a situation in which they were made to marry.

If we can pass the Bill and ensure that fewer children are put into that position, we must do so. As child marriage does not have one cause, it does not have one solution. Ending the practice of child marriage will take the efforts of many communities, individuals and Governments, but the Bill will continue the process of its eradication. We have a duty, as Members of Parliament, to ensure that no more children enter into marriage, which is why I must support the Bill today.

Sally-Ann Hart (Conservative, Hastings and Rye)

I welcome the Bill, which is to:

“Make provision about the minimum age for marriage and civil partnership, and for connected purposes.”

When I was researching the Bill to write this speech, I came across an American news channel reporting that the minimum age for marriage in Carolina was going to be raised from 14 years old to 16 years old, that the teen’s spouse would be required to be no more than four years older, and that the teen’s written parental consent would be required to marry. I have to admit that I was rather flabbergasted. A 14-year-old is a child. A 16-year-old is a child.

Time and again, as with the trauma of the poor Russian skater, Kamila Valieva—who is a child at 15—at the recent winter Olympics that I am sure many hon. Members witnessed, we see situations where adults are not making the right or best decisions for children. Children are children until they reach adulthood at 18 years old. It is absolutely right that the Bill has been brought forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham), and I welcome the fact that it and the amendments discussed earlier today have been supported by hon. Members on both sides of the House and by the Government.

Children need to be children, to be permitted to be children, and to enjoy all the joy and freedom without adult responsibilities. Child rights are fundamental freedoms and must be inherent in all children under the age of 18, irrespective of race, religion, sex or any other status. Children are not the property of their parents. They are human beings and they have rights.

The convention on the rights of the child sets out the rights that must be realised for children to develop their full potential. It offers a vision of the child as an individual and as a member of the family and community, with rights and responsibilities appropriate to his or her age and stage of development. In recognising children’s rights in that way, it firmly sets the focus on the whole child.

All children should have and deserve to have access to opportunities. Children are innocent. They are full of hope and joy, and they are trusting. Rather than be thrown or forced into an adult life, they should be allowed to mature gradually through new experiences that are age appropriate. It is a travesty that for far too many children, the reality of their childhood is all too different. Throughout history, children have been abused and exploited by adults, whether through slave labour, hunger, homelessness, limited education opportunities and so on.

Childhood must be protected and children should be allowed and encouraged to develop in their own time. Marriage or a civil partnership is an adult decision and requires thought. A party to a marriage should not take a passive approach. It is not something for someone to go along with or have done to them—it requires mature thought. Marriage is an important part of building healthy and protected relationships, families and societies.

Marriage should not cause harm to either party. Early and forced marriages often take place in communities where there is a wider social context that denies women’s and children’s rights. Currently, in England and Wales the minimum age for marriage or civil partnership without parental or other third-party consent, or judicial consent, is 18. A person who is 16 or 17 may marry or form a civil partnership only with consent—with some very rare exceptions, in which a 16 or 17-year-old is a widow or widower, or a surviving civil partner. A marriage or civil partnership is void if either of the parties is under the age of 16.

The Bill would raise to 18 the minimum age for marriage and civil partnership in England and Wales. That might affect marriages and civil partnerships that take place outside England and Wales. A change in the common law will also mean that any marriages involving under-18s that take place overseas, or in Scotland or Northern Ireland, will not be legally recognised in England and Wales if one of the parties is domiciled in England or Wales. That change to recognition will also apply to civil partnerships. I acknowledge the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire about issues to do with Scotland and Northern Ireland; I, too, encourage Scotland and Northern Ireland to take the Bill on board.

The Bill will also make it illegal for a person to arrange the marriage of a person under the age of 18 in England and Wales in circumstances where that is not already illegal. In 2018, the most recent year for which data is available, 147 16 to 17-year-olds entered into a legally binding marriage with a person of the opposite sex, representing a very small proportion—0.06%—of all marriages that took place in England and Wales in 2018. Marriages of same-sex couples or civil partnerships are not reported with a detailed age breakdown. The issue is about not the small number, but each of those individuals who have had something done to or for them over which they have had no control.

The majority of 16 to 17-year-olds who marry are female. In 2018, 119 of the 16 to 17-year-olds getting married were female, while 28 were male. Over the past five years, an average of 79% of all 16 to 17-year-olds getting married have been female. UNICEF considers that child marriage is a violation of human rights, regardless of sex, but has emphasised that child marriage often compromises a girl’s development by resulting in early pregnancy and social isolation, interrupting her schooling, limiting her opportunities for career and vocational advancement, and placing her at increased risk of domestic violence. Although the impact on child grooms has not been extensively studied, marriage may similarly place boys in an adult role for which they are unprepared and may place economic pressures on them and curtail their opportunities for further education or career advancement.

Gender equality and ending the exploitation of women and girls are vital. One of the United Nations sustainable development goals agreed by world leaders is to eliminate all harmful practices such as child early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child recommends that there should be no legal way for anyone to marry before they turn 18, even if there is parental consent.

The Bill would also expand the existing criminal law on forced marriage to make it illegal for a person to arrange the marriage of a person under 18 in England and Wales. In 2020, the forced marriage unit gave advice or support in 759 cases related to a possible forced marriage and/or possible female genital mutilation. A significant majority related to forced marriage, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire has already pointed out. The forced marriage unit notes that the overall case number represents a 44% decrease on the average number of cases received annually between 2011 and 2019, which was 1,359. The decrease is thought to be attributable to the pandemic, owing to restrictions on weddings and overseas travel.

Proceedings interrupted (Standing Order No. 11(4)).

Sally-Ann Hart (Conservative, Hastings and Rye)

To go back to the forced marriage unit, it set out additional information on the cases it dealt with in 2020. Of the cases that it provided advice or support to in 2020, 26% involved victims below 18 years of age, 37% involved victims aged 18 to 25 and 9% involved victims with mental capacity concerns, while 79% involved female victims and 21% involved male victims.

Last year, the Government published their tackling violence against women and girls strategy, which sets out a range of actions aimed at tackling acts of violence or abuse that disproportionately affect women and girls, and forced marriage is identified as one such issue. The strategy states that

“the Government remains committed to the goal of ending child marriage in this country. We also recognise the need to signal to other countries that child marriage is something which needs to be tackled.”

The strategy also states:

“Child marriage and having children too early in life can deprive children of important life chances, which is why the Government will support raising the age of marriage and civil partnership in England and Wales from 16 to 18, when an appropriate legislative vehicle becomes available, to help stamp out marriage of minors. The age of 18 is widely recognised as the age at which one becomes an adult, and at which full citizenship rights should be gained.”This Bill is the legislative vehicle to stamp out the marriage of minors, and I wholeheartedly support it and the amendments agreed to today.

Danny Kruger (Conservative, Devizes)

I express my very sincere congratulations to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid), who got the ball rolling on this, but principally to my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) on her heroic work in getting the Bill to this point. My congratulations go to her family in the Gallery—she married at a respectable age—and most of all to the campaigners. It is a tremendous thing that they have done, and I am very much in awe of their campaigning and their work, so many thanks and congratulations.

As my hon. Friend says, if someone is too young to consent to marriage, they are too young to marry. That is an absolutely inviolable point. I am glad that we are honouring the declarations of various international bodies, such as UNICEF, which says that child marriage is a violation of human rights; our own commitments to the sustainable development goals, which committed this country to eliminate child, early and forced marriage; and the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, which says that there should be no legal way to marry before 18, even with parental consent.

I understand that in 2018, the last year for which data has been collected, there were only 147 marriages of people aged 16 or 17, of whom 80% were female—girls—which tells a tale. Of course, our real concern is about the marriages of children that take place abroad and can then be recognised here in the UK. I echo the point made by my hon. Friend and many other hon. Members that the legislation is not about criminalising the actions of children; it is about seeking to stop adults organising child marriage.

I pay particular tribute to the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma), who spoke so well, passionately and with enormous sincerity about his own mother and the work she did, having been a child bride herself, to found a school in her village to educate girls. What an inspiration she must have been both to her own daughters, who grew up to have professional careers, and to the hon. Member himself. I am grateful to have heard that story.

I applaud the commitment in this legislation to remove what my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire calls the Gretna Green exceptions. I am very pleased to hear that Northern Ireland is consulting on raising the age of marriage, and I hope that Scotland does so, too. I am sure that they will want to align with the sustainable development goals as soon as possible.

I think I speak accurately when I say that I am sure my hon. Friend is not being anti-marriage with this legislation; I know that she has the opposite attitude. We need more marriage in this country. I recognise what the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall said about the life-limiting effects of early marriage, but we can overcompensate as, to a degree, we have in this country. I was dismayed and concerned to hear my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire say that the average age of marriage in this country is now over 30. We have organised the economic and social rewards in our society to put off marriage and children until very late, which I regret. The decline of marriage in our society should be a cause of great regret, as it is a cause of much distress to adults.

We are talking about the rights of children, and the greatest right a child has is to a secure home. We know that marriage is the best means of ensuring this. There are many economic pressures on families in our society, and we have the smallest houses and the longest commutes in Europe. What does that do to family life? We have steadily removed the fiscal support for marriage over the past two generations, and there is a cultural or ideological attack on marriage and the family. There is an assumption that marriage is a patriarchal institution that is inherently abusive and unequal. We have heard stories today of where that can be the case, so we need to remove the danger of fulfilling that false stereotype of marriage.

Marriage is a public act for a reason, and in the Anglican service we are asked to give any just cause or impediment for why a couple should not be married. This Bill removes the possibility of abuse and the opportunity for child marriage. Marriage is fundamentally about the responsibilities of adulthood, and it is the foundation of our society. This Bill restores the integrity of the institution, and I am very proud to support it.

Virginia Crosbie (Conservative, Ynys Môn)

I am pleased to speak in this debate. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) on introducing this important Bill, which I support.

This is an incredibly complex Bill, and it has been a real team effort. I thank the Ministers and officials, and I pay particular tribute to those in the Public Gallery and other tireless campaigners for raising awareness of this child abuse.

Many of us are parents, and we have all been 16, albeit for some of us it is a distant memory. When I was 16, I thought I would marry David Cassidy. I thought we would have kids called Kylie and Jason and a dog called Freeway. We know how grown-up and responsible we felt at 16, but we also realise just how much we still had to learn and experience at that young age.

In the UK, the average age of marriage is now 30. The fact that official figures for the marriage of 16 and 17-year-olds in the UK continue to fall is evidence that, in general, our society recognises that marriage before the age of 18 is not necessarily the great idea it might seem at that age. It is widely recognised, however, that the official UK data does not reflect the full picture. It does not take account of child marriages enacted through religious and customary ceremonies that are not legally recognised, and there is, of course, currently no way of monitoring the misuse of the loophole that permits parents in the UK to use parental consent to force their children into matrimony.

My hon. Friend’s Bill expands existing criminal law on forced marriage to make it illegal for a person to arrange the marriage of anyone under the age of 18 in England and Wales. Importantly, the offence will apply to any religious or civil ceremony of marriage, whether or not it is deemed legally binding in the UK and whether or not coercion is used.

The amendments debated today add further weight to the Bill, making it more targeted and offering more protection to young girls by removing significant loopholes in the current legislation, including deception, in England, Wales and elsewhere. Elsewhere is important, as marriage is devolved and a child can be taken to Northern Ireland or Scotland to marry. I was pleased to support amendment 4, and I state for the record that Northern Ireland is consulting on the age of marriage. I hope Scotland will do the same, as it is important to remove this dangerous loophole so that all children in the UK are covered.

These changes align with the Government’s tackling violence against women and girls strategy and will provide unequivocal protection to young women in the UK.

Anthony Browne (Conservative, South Cambridgeshire)

My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech about the need to raise the age of marriage. Does she agree that if somebody is judged too young to buy an alcoholic drink in a bar, drive a car or buy a firework, and too young to be trusted to vote in an election or to consent to a marriage, they must be too young to marry?

Virginia Crosbie (Conservative, Ynys Môn)

I thank my hon. Friend for his powerful words. He makes a powerful statement with which I wholeheartedly agree.

The UN estimates that 110 million girls will marry before their 18th birthday in the next decade. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child recommends that there should be no legal way for anyone to marry before they turn 18, even if there is parental consent. In 2016, it made the recommendation that the UK

“raise the minimum age of marriage to 18 years across all devolved administrations, overseas territories and Crown dependencies.”

The UN sustainable development goals require all countries to eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation by 2030. It is a duty of the UK Government to take a lead and clearly demonstrate that they take the matter seriously and that child marriage, under any circumstances, is wrong. In doing so, the Bill will not just serve the girls of the UK but help to tackle child marriage globally.

It is a privilege to be the Member of Parliament for Ynys Môn. I entered politics to try to make tomorrow a better day for as many as possible and to try to be a voice for those who have no voice, particularly children. We now have a Bill to protect some of the most vulnerable in this country and around the world, and I am proud to give it my support.

Richard Holden (Conservative, North West Durham)

I am honoured to be able to speak today and I was delighted to serve on the Committee with my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) in the earlier stages of the Bill. It is great to follow my hon. Friends the Members for Ynys Môn (Virginia Crosbie), for Devizes (Danny Kruger) and for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart) and others who have made great speeches.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire knows, the Bill will have to go through the other place as well, so it is great to see Baroness Sugg in the Gallery, who has been great in supporting me in some of the legislation that I have been pushing for on banning hymenoplasty and virginity testing. I know that my hon. Friend has also been working with Payzee, Karma Nirvana and others who are also in the Gallery, who have been supportive in pushing this legislation forwards and in pushing for rights for women and girls in many other areas.

We need to concentrate on the small number of people who are using the exemption at the moment. They are not the children themselves, but their parents and other adults who are pushing them into it. The hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma), in his superb speech, mentioned the importance of education and how people should be pursuing objectives in their lives before making big decisions such as marriage. It was a powerful speech and it is great that the Bill has fantastic cross-party support.

I am also delighted that the amendments have been made to the Bill, especially on the issue of deceiving a child, and it is great that progress has been made to tighten up the amendments relating to judicial scope. As my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire referred to, the Gretna Green amendment, which relates to domiciliary versus habitual residency, is important and plays into what hon. Members have spoken about relating to Scotland and Northern Ireland. I hope that those devolved nations look at the recommendations of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child and at the superb letter from the Joint Committee on Human Rights by the Mother of the House, the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), who emphasised the points that were made and how they support the actions taken in the Bill.

As hon. Members have mentioned, changing the law is one thing but changing attitudes is another. As with my amendments to the Health and Care Bill about virginity testing and hymenoplasty, I hope making this change to the law will actually drive real cultural changes. We are showing leadership by changing the law in this House, but only by embedding those cultural changes will we see changes not only in this country but across the rest of the world.

This is one of the many measures from Back Benchers that this Government have been supporting. I hope that they will do more on women’s rights, which are often one of those things where battles feel that they may have already been won, but that is definitely not the case. As we have seen with various private Members’ Bills and amendments to other Bills over the past year or two, there is still further to go. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire on doing what she has done and thank Members from across the House for their support for her. I hope that we can all continue to push forward on some of these issues, because these battles are still to be won.

Luke Evans (Conservative, Bosworth)

Let me start by paying tribute to the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma) for his speech and, in particular, what he said about his mother. I was struck by how heartfelt it was and by the opportunity that she gave. My biggest concern was for those who are not so fortunate as to have such an opportunity, which is why this legislation is so important. That leads me on to my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham), whom I congratulate on her strength and ability to bring the technical aspects forward and on having the courage of her conviction to stand up and make the statement, “This is wrong.” I wholeheartedly support her.

I got married recently, in 2019. It took me seven years to pop the question and 18 months to organise the wedding.

Virendra Sharma (Labour, Ealing, Southall)

Was this at 16 years or older than that?

Luke Evans (Conservative, Bosworth)

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind compliments. I am the tender age of 39, so there is still a bit of time to go there. Time does pass fast for those who need to wait two years, although my wife may have wished the seven years had passed more quickly.

To me, there are three parts to becoming married: the legal aspect; the religious aspect; and the declaration to one’s friends and family. I am not religious, and I had a legal wedding held in a registry office, with a celebration with my friends and family two weeks later. When I went into that legal office, I was struck by the interviews and questions, with me and my partner being separated in order to find out what was going on, how we were stepping into this and what thought process we had gone through. This was done to see whether there was any coercion. That is what brought my attention to this Bill, because it struck me that it is so important to do that. I thought, “If this is happening to adults, what must happen to children at this point?” The fact that the legislation was not there to protect people was a huge concern for me.

So I am so pleased to see this legislation being brought forward, especially with the extension to the age of 18. Other Members have made the point that we are coalescing around the age of 18 for education, tobacco, tattoos, alcohol and indeed voting. So this seems sensible to me, because that is where we are defining the end of childhood and moving on to later life.

Richard Holden (Conservative, North West Durham)

In the past year or so, we have also increased the age at which people can buy a lottery ticket to 18. So we are moving in this direction right across the piece, and that recognition of adulthood at 18 is at the core of all my hon. Friend is saying and of the Bill.

Luke Evans (Conservative, Bosworth)

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend on that. There is a debate as to whether joining the armed forces should move from 16 to 18 as well, in order to join it all up, from voting to tobacco, alcohol and gambling. Eighteen seems a sensible place to call it, and the House should be able to agree on that.

When I came to look at the Bill, there were concerns about it: would we just drive the practice further underground? How will it actually be tackled? And how will it be enforced? I am so pleased to hear that the provision is being extended to cover anyone who has ever lived in the UK, because that is really important in order to cut out that loophole. I was also pleased to hear my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire so eloquently make the point about the importance of education on this in schools. I would go one step further, because, as a GP, I know it is really important that social services and healthcare workers, who will often see people at their most vulnerable and have the opportunity to pick up on these things, are aware that this is still a problem. We may be talking only about 150 or so cases, but that still means 150 or so lives that could in theory be ruined. Medical professionals and social services should be able to pick up on that and to have the training to be able to do so. There is a concern about whether this is a chicken and egg situation, but we have to start somewhere. I am pleased that the legislation will lead into changing the culture that my hon. Friend the Member for North West Durham (Mr Holden) has so honestly talked about.

Having a Minister sat in front of me when it comes to talking about the issue of marriage, it would be remiss of me not to lead on to a couple of further points. Here I wish to draw some parallel with what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger), who talked about the institution of marriage. I entirely agree with him that we should be encouraging more people to get married.

The pandemic put a spotlight on marriage and the way in which we do it—how we relaxed the legislation on where it can happen and what it can look like. That is a really important thing, because the culture around marriage is changing, as we have heard in this debate. Going forward, there is an argument for recognising humanist marriages in our current culture, and I was very grateful that the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove), replied to a letter I wrote about humanist marriages, to say:

“As I expressed during the recent Westminster Hall debate on humanist marriage in England and Wales, marriage will always be one of our most important institutions, and we have a duty to consider the implications of any changes to the law in this area very carefully.

The Government remains committed to considering the case for more comprehensive and enduring reform to marriage law once the Law Commission has completed its fundamental review of the law in this area. The Law Commission will present options for reforms to modernise marriage law, including how marriage by humanist and other non-religious belief organisations could be incorporated into a revised or new scheme that is simple, fair and consistent for all groups. The Government will carefully consider the Law Commission’s recommendations when the final report is published.”

I wholeheartedly agree with that statement, because there is an opportunity here to address some of the religious and cultural aspects of marriage as one of those three pillars that I mentioned. To me, the fundamental part was the declaration in front of my friends and family. That may well be a religious aspect for other people, but we have a chance to create a framework that incorporates all the good work of my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire into a wider set of legislation. I hope the Government are listening, because there is a real opportunity to give people the opportunity to enter into marriage and provide that stability for their family, their children, and of course their community. I wholeheartedly support the Bill.

Peter Gibson (Conservative, Darlington)

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans), and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) on having brought forward this Bill. She has campaigned tirelessly on this issue for many years, and I commend her for stepping into the breach and expertly guiding this legislation through Committee to today’s Third Reading. I was privileged to support her in serving on the Bill Committee, and I am pleased to be here to support her today. I know from my own experience that bringing forward a private Member’s Bill is a hugely rewarding process, particularly when it stands a real chance of becoming law, but it can also be a challenging one, and I congratulate my hon. Friend on reaching this stage. I also pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid) for the work that he has done, not just in support of the Bill but on child protection more generally. It was good to see him in his place earlier.

The most important thing to note about this Bill is that it is not an attack on the institution of marriage; it offers marriage significant respect, aiming to ensure that those who enter into a marriage are fully able to judge whether it is the right choice for them. The age of 18 is an appropriate point at which to set a benchmark for such a lifelong commitment, and not before. While statistics show that child marriage primarily affects girls, it must be remembered that this issue can affect boys, too. The Bill is essential to protecting all children, no matter their sex.

Child marriage can have a devastating impact on vulnerable children, denying them the opportunity to fully participate in society. We know that children who are subject to child marriage have significantly worse opportunities and life chances, including a lack of education and job opportunities; the removal of independence; serious physical and mental health problems; and developmental difficulties for children born to young mothers, alongside an increased risk of domestic abuse and divorce. Effectively, the experience for many who are coerced into child marriage is the entrenchment of poverty and being limited to a life of low education. Banning child marriage, which this Bill effectively does, will give those who would have been vulnerable to it a greater chance to fully engage in our society, safeguarding their future so that from the age of 18 they will not have been denied the same opportunities afforded to others.

In 2022, education or vocational training is compulsory up to the age of 18, and the average age of marriage—as we have heard—is now 30. It seems entirely outdated that provision for marriage at 16 remains on our statute books, allowing children to enter into a lifelong commitment as significant as marriage before they have even completed their schooling. However, it is not surprising that the system is not fit for the modern age, given that our current laws date back to 1929.

It is essential that we ensure that children have enough time to grow and mature before entering marriage or civil partnership, which is potentially a lifelong commitment with significant legal and financial consequences. I am delighted that the Bill seeks to close loopholes and address the practice of child marriage in England and Wales while modernising legislation so that it reflects today’s society.

I have already mentioned non-registered religious and cultural marriages that take place in the UK. Indeed, laws on marriage apply only to registered marriage ceremonies; the only requirement on religious marriages is that they are not forced marriages. However, that in itself poses a problem. To prove a forced marriage, the courts must find that there has been coercion or that undue pressure has been exerted on someone to enter into the marriage. That means that, in effect, in the case of child marriages, the child would need to give evidence that may condemn their parents, but children aged 16 are unlikely to go against their parents who look after and bring them up. In effect, they cannot act independently, so the child forced into a marriage will, more likely than not, say that they consented to the child marriage.

I am pleased that the Bill rightly covers those unregistered religious marriages. It will make arrangements so that any marriage, be it religious or civil, that involves a person under the age of 18 will automatically be categorised as a forced marriage. That categorisation will remove the ability of someone to claim that consent was given. We should be mindful of that get-out in the coming months as we consider legislation covering a ban on conversion therapy.

The Bill will ensure that those who facilitate or encourage child marriage will be committing an offence and rightly face criminal charges. I am delighted that it will ensure that those who attempt to coerce children into marriage will face the consequences of their actions. They will face prison time, including a maximum sentence of 12 months in prison, or a fine—or both—in the magistrates court, or up to seven years in prison in the Crown court.

The Bill also tackles child marriages that take place abroad. All too often, a child can be taken abroad to be forced into a marriage that they are in no way old enough to consent to. Under our current legislation, we would be unable to punish those who take a child abroad for marriage unless the child was willing to testify that they had been forced into it. The Bill will close that loophole. Under its provisions, all marriages of under-18s that take place abroad will not be legally recognised in England and Wales if either party is domiciled here. That will not only act as a further obstacle to those seeking a child abroad to marry, but make it clear to professionals such as teachers and social workers that they should report children travelling abroad to marry if they are made aware of it.

I am proud that the UK is committed to achieving by 2030 the UN sustainable development goals, one of which requires all countries to eliminate the practice of child, early and forced marriages. We cannot criticise child marriage around the world and encourage other nations to stamp out that harmful practice until we have stamped it out in our country. The Bill will rightly allow us to live up to our international obligations.

I am delighted to be here to support my hon. Friend’s Bill. It will bring our legislation into the 21st century and ensure that we afford vulnerable children the protection that they deserve from forced and damaging child marriages. I hope that it will pass its Third Reading today and secure its place on the statute book.

Anna McMorrin (Labour, Cardiff North)

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham) for her outstanding commitment to this issue. I am grateful to be here to respond to this important debate on behalf of the Opposition. It has been good to see significant cross-party co-operation and consensus throughout the Bill’s stages. I support the comments made by hon. Members and the amendments that will ensure that the law cannot be bypassed and that the police will have the powers to prosecute despite lack of evidence of coercion or violence. I hope that the right guidance and training will follow for both the police and the CPS.

I, too, commend the speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma). It was an incredibly powerful and passionate speech about a very personal issue involving his mother and about why we must ban child marriage. In 2018, fewer than 150 fifteen and sixteen-year-olds entered marriage, out of a total of 235,000 marriages in England and Wales. But these figures understate the issue. Allowing marriage as young as 16 encourages those who support child marriage at even younger ages and has the potential to set a very dangerous precedent. Raising the age to 18 draws a clear line between child and adult. This Bill ensures that there are no circumstances under which a child can be legally married or enter a civil partnership under the age of 18—something that the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child asked for back in 2016.

Barnardo’s, the children’s charity, has raised concerns that marriage for children aged 16 or 17 can result in their experiencing domestic violence and sexual abuse, and missing out on important educational opportunities. The purpose of the Bill is to address those concerns and the concern that marriage at such a young age can leave vulnerable young people open to coercion and forced marriage. Sixteen and 17-year-olds make up over 10% of forced marriages. These vulnerable children need our protection, and I am grateful to be here on behalf of the Opposition to support the Bill.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights defines child marriage as

“any marriage where at least one of the parties is under 18 years of age.”

It defines forced marriage as

“a marriage in which one and/or both parties have not personally expressed their full and free consent to the union.”

The high commissioner’s view is that all child marriages equate to forced marriages, as a child cannot give full, free and informed consent.

This issue overwhelmingly impacts women and girls. An astonishing 80% of those who married as children in 2018 were girls. As shadow Minister for victims, I have heard at first hand the devastating impact that forced marriages have on young women. I spoke to one young woman recently who bravely shared her story with me. She was terrified, fleeing from her forced marriage—forced to flee her family home, forced to hide from her parents and forced now to remain in hiding. Luckily, she is supported by a wonderful organisation, which I will not name for security reasons.

There are many great organisations out there helping young woman like that, but what about the women and girls who are not supported by anyone—the ones who are all alone, trapped in these marriages? I hope that the Government’s forthcoming victims Bill can help to address those issues, too, and increase the protection of these vulnerable individuals by consolidating their rights in statute, as the Opposition outlined in our response to the Government’s consultation. If victims are made aware of their rights, it will allow those who wish to leave marriages that they have been forced into to be supported.

There is also the issue of individuals who do not report forced marriage. Specially trained staff in schools are absolutely vital in looking out for the signs of forced marriage, but there is a concerning lack of similar training for registry office staff, as has been mentioned. Only about a fifth of reports to the forced marriage unit in 2019 were from the victims themselves. Most reports —64%—were from professionals, such as those in education, social services, and the legal and health sectors, which makes training and support for those sectors much more important.

I am pleased that the Government are supporting the Bill, but they have the opportunity to go further and support victims of forced marriages in the forthcoming victims Bill. The current law is outdated, and family life has moved on significantly since its inception. The fact that a young person must remain in education until he or she is 18 but can marry at 16 is bewildering, and has no place in the 21st century. The Bill is a crucial and substantial step forward in correcting that situation and, on behalf of the Opposition, I wish it well in its remaining stages.

Tom Pursglove (Conservative, Corby)

Let me begin by again offering my wholehearted support to my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Mrs Latham), who has been a persistent and tireless campaigner on this issue for many years. She has run an exemplary campaign, which Members throughout the House will no doubt want to study and monitor for their own purposes in the years ahead when introducing their own private Members’ legislation.

I pay tribute to colleagues on both sides of the House for their contributions, not just today but throughout the Bill’s passage, and for the constructive spirit in which these matters have been approached. We have seen the House at its very best. I, too, pay tribute to the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma) for the way in which he talked about his own personal experiences and those of his mother. What an inspirational story that is for all of us, and one on which we will all no doubt reflect in the days ahead: it was very much a forerunner of this Bill. I think it important also to place on record that my hon. Friend’s campaign has been so persistent and so successful that she has also had brilliant backing from both the Home Secretary and the Deputy Prime Minister in getting the Bill to this stage.

Having the privilege of being the Minister responsible for marriage and divorce, I am particularly aware of how necessary these provisions are. Many people are surprised when I inform them that child marriage is still legal in this country. As our society changes for the better, it is important that our laws are kept up to date. The Bill ensures that children can no longer legally enter into a marriage or civil partnership in England and Wales. It also tackles unregistered marriage ceremonies by expanding the offence of forced marriage to make it illegal to arrange for a child to enter marriage where coercion is not used. The Bill is taking positive action to protect children. Our objective throughout has been to protect as many children as possible from this harm.

The changes to the legal age of marriage only impact individuals who wish to marry aged 16 or 17 on a temporary basis; as soon as they turn 18, they can get married if they choose. In the meantime, they can focus more fully on tasks such as completing their education, which will help to maximise their future potential and life chances. The Bill also promotes equal opportunities. We know that girls are more likely to marry as children, and therefore more likely to be impacted by the adverse effects of child marriage that my hon. Friend helpfully set out.

The Children’s Commissioner recently carried out “The Big Ask”, a national survey of England’s children. When asked about their worries, some children reported their fear of being pressurised into a marriage that they did not want. No child should have to face the horror of forced marriage. As my hon. Friend said, it is not the norm. Pressurising a child in this way is abhorrent and we should call it out for what it is. Through the Bill, of course, we are taking action not just to call it out, but to have in place a strong legal framework to deal with that abuse.

A marriage or civil partnership should only be formed if both parties freely consent and are properly able to make that choice. A family not formed on that basis is unlikely to bring benefits to its members or to society, and may be more likely to lead to issues such as domestic abuse and emotional distress. Increasing the age of marriage to 18 is also likely to reduce the risk of relationship breakdown owing to the increased age and maturity of the parties involved. Marriage is an important institution that we want to protect and strengthen as much as possible, as was so eloquently set out by my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans).

I will now turn to the specific asks of Government made by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire. I agree with her that it is vital we commence these changes as soon as possible and I know that officials are working on implementation plans. However, as much as I would like to, I cannot make a commitment that the Bill will be ready to be commenced by the school summer holidays. I am keen, however, to expedite as far as feasibly possible the work we need to do to implement the Bill.

The changes made by the Bill require a set of implementation activities, including updating the General Register Office’s IT systems and amending secondary legislation. Forced marriage changes will impact multiple agencies, requiring updates to guidance, systems and processes. Those would most likely affect the police, the Crown Prosecution Service, the courts, the Prison Service and the probation service. We also need to make sure that the public are given plenty of notice that the law is changing and to be mindful of those who may be planning weddings which were perfectly legal at the time that notice was given.

As the Bill would not reach Royal Assent until later this Session, the ask would therefore be commencement within a few months, and I fear that that is too steep a mountain to climb. Much implementation activity cannot happen until Royal Assent, because until then we cannot be certain that the Bill will become law or what its exact shape will be. Like my hon. Friend, however, I have every confidence in Baroness Sugg, who I know will shepherd the Bill effectively through the other place to make sure no time is wasted at that end in getting the legislation into law. At our end, I give my hon. Friend my assurance that we will commence as soon as we possibly can, but just as it is important that this law starts protecting children as soon as possible, it is also important that it does not come in until the relevant statutory agencies are properly set up to deal with it, because there would be nothing worse than a case which was mishandled through lack of knowledge or gaps in the underlying systems. She knows I always like to drive a hard bargain. I am mindful of timeliness and I can assure her there will be no needless or unnecessary delay.

I can also reassure my hon. Friend that the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), and I will both work with the Department for Education to ensure that we raise awareness in schools about the changes in the law. I understand that next week she will be meeting with the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), the Minister for children and families, to discuss that very issue. As with so many changes in the realm of hidden harms such as forced marriage, changes in the law are a necessary but by no means sufficient condition to achieve change on the ground. I can also tell her, by way of an update, that I recently had a meeting with the Children’s Commissioner where I raised this very issue. It is fair to say that my hon. Friend would be pushing at an open door in terms of engaging with her, because she has been exceptionally supportive of the Bill and is keen to help on awareness. I am grateful to the Children’s Commissioner for her support for this work.

Virendra Sharma (Labour, Ealing, Southall)

This is an historic move in British history and it will be remembered for many years to come, so can the Minister look at naming the Bill the Pauline Latham Bill?

Tom Pursglove (Conservative, Corby)

The hon. Gentleman is one of the most decent and incredibly kind Members of this House. I have to say, however, that I do not think that that is a decision I will have to make, as it is highly likely that the Bill will regularly be referred to as the Pauline Latham Bill and rightly so. All of us in this House are incredibly proud of her for the work she has done in advancing this cause. I think that decision may be taken out of our hands, because that will just be the term by which the legislation will be referred to. We are grateful to her—we really are.

I can confirm that the multi-agency guidance which the Home Office produces on forced marriage will be updated to take account of the changes to the law. That contains chapters for different professions, including the police, teachers and social workers, and we will update all of them to reflect the amendments in the law. I am sure that, as they always do, the College of Policing will update operational guidance for the police in line with the changes to our guidance. While it is not for me to promise changes to the CPS guidance, as the CPS is independent, it will always make necessary changes to its guidance to reflect changes in the law, and I see no reason why it would not do so in this case, too. By way of trying to be constructive, I will undertake to ensure awareness among my ministerial colleagues in different parts of Government, so that the conversations they have with those various agencies in the months ahead touch on this issue, and underline the importance we place on it and the need to get these things right.

Richard Holden (Conservative, North West Durham)

One issue we are trying to address today is the cultural issue. Will the Minister commit to at least examining having a proper awareness campaign when the law changes, with a good round of media interviews from Ministers, and reaching out into communities where we know this issue is more prevalent than in others? It is important that we ram home the message from this united House not just that there is a change in the law, but that we are trying to drive a broader cultural change in society.

Tom Pursglove (Conservative, Corby)

Having been his Whip, I know my hon. Friend is always brimming with ideas about initiatives that the Government can take forward. He makes a rather good suggestion and it is certainly something I am mindful of and want to take away and consider. Throughout the passage of the Bill, we have heard extremely difficult testimony from individuals who have suffered the pain and trauma of these sorts of marriages. They have talked bravely about the impact that that has had on them, their families and their lives. It is important that we help them to share their stories in a way that they are comfortable with, to ensure that we drive awareness of these changes. I am always keen to do media interviews about positive announcements, as he will appreciate, but often hearing directly from survivors of this sort of unacceptable abuse is the most powerful testimony and will be inspirational in generating that greater awareness, ensuring that people know exactly the signs to spot and articulating the measures that we are taking to clamp down on this.

On the Scotland and Northern Ireland plea, I must respect that the devolved Administrations are independent. Indeed, we have taken great care to respect the devolution settlement, hence the amendments made today, ensuring that the law covers only those situations where there is a clear link to England and Wales. We in England and Wales are levelling up, tackling the awful practice of child marriage. I have put on the record in the House, and will repeat now, my wholehearted hope that Scotland and Northern Ireland will follow our lead. Colleagues in Edinburgh and Belfast cannot fail to have heard the unanimous backing for these vital measures in the House. We have all committed to eliminating child marriage by 2030 under the UN sustainable development goals. Setting a strong example at home will also help to tackle the issue globally. Leadership by example is crucial in that regard.

I have no doubt that the passionate campaign that we have seen in Westminster will now focus its energies on Edinburgh and Belfast with great vigour. I hope that Scottish and Northern Irish colleagues in this House, from all parties, will want to take this forward and champion the agenda in the devolved areas. That is important advocacy. They ought to consider taking up that baton to help the campaign in any way they can.

In closing, I reiterate my thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire for introducing this important Bill. I also reiterate, wholeheartedly, the Government’s support for it. It is an enormous privilege to be the victims Minister. One reason for that is that I come across exceptional people who have been through so much and show great courage, despite the trauma, distress, sadness, hurt and upset that they feel. Often, they put others first to ensure that the harm, suffering and distress that they feel does not happen to others. A remarkable group of people have been involved in this work and I wish briefly to pay tribute to and thank them. Naomi, Natasha, Farhana, Sara, Payzee, Charlotte, Lubna and Nana—thank you for the work you have done on this issue. Your advocacy has been extraordinary. I have no doubt that the work that you have done, the courage that you have shown and the effort that you have put in will change the lives of thousands of young people in our country for the better.

I am delighted that we are joined in the House today by the Lathams. I thank Derek, Tracey, Poppy and Harry for your superb support for wife, for mum, for grandma who has done something very special. We are hugely grateful to her and incredibly proud of her, and I know that you will be as well. We just all join in that tribute.

This may not be a long Bill, but the impact is far-reaching, and many lives will be changed for the better because of it. On what is a dark day in our world, this is a chink of light and one that all of us in this House and across the country can welcome. With that, I thank my officials for the work that they have done to bring this forward: the Bill manager, Alice Harrison; Andrew Lewis; Rachel Stark; Nicola Henderson; and Joanna Norris as well as those in my private office, particularly Tomos Macdonald, and Minister Maclean’s private office as well. Everybody who has been involved in the Bill can be incredibly proud of it. I wish it a speedy passage through the House of Lords and I commend it to the House.

Nigel Evans (Conservative, Ribble Valley)

It is now my pleasure to call my friend who apparently is going to give her name to an Act—perhaps.

Pauline Latham (Conservative, Mid Derbyshire)

With the leave of the House, I would like to say a few words of thanks. It has been a strange day. I cannot remember any time when a Bill has been interrupted by an urgent question and then continued, so it has been a little strange today. I thank those who came to support me for sitting through not just the Bill, which has been exceptionally long, but the urgent question, too.

I thank all right hon. and hon. Members in this House who have contributed to today’s debate, and also to other debates that we have had through the passage of this Bill. It has been a pleasure to hear the resounding support to end child marriage from every corner of the House. As many people know, I have campaigned on this issue for many years—I think it is five years, but it might be six or even four; I forget. The Bill has been supported every step of the way by the charities that make up the Girls Not Brides UK coalition—Karma Nirvana, the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation, the Independent Yemen Group, the Foundation of Women’s Health Research and Development and others. They have been tireless in their support. I am delighted that they can be here to witness this House vote to end child marriage. Like the Minister, I thank them for all their hard work, without which we would not be at this stage today. They have been tireless and they have kept us focused to make sure that this is the best Bill that we could possibly have.

I particularly want to thank two of our amazing ambassadors: Payzee Mahmod and Farhana Raval. They have been incredibly brave telling their stories and inspirational for many of us who have gone on this journey. They have shone a light on the terrible consequences of child marriage. I thank Payzee and Farhana for their support.

On the legal side, I must pay tribute to two superb barristers who work with the group: Naomi Wiseman and Dr Charlotte Proudman. We also have two little ones up in the Public Gallery who have also sat through pretty much most of this today. They will not be allowed to get married when they get to 16; they will have to wait until they are 18. The support of Naomi Wiseman and Dr Charlotte Proudman in drafting and their technological knowledge was instrumental in getting the wording of the Bill exactly right.

I have already mentioned the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove) and the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean) Without their advocacy within Government, their incredible support and their willingness to listen time and again to my representations—they must have thought, “Oh, she’s at it again”—we could not have got this Bill to the excellent stage in which it now finds itself. Their officials have also been tenacious, hard-working and supportive, and I thank them for engaging with me and the team of experts at Girls Not Brides UK.

The Clerk of the private Members’ Bills has been incredibly helpful, indeed probably more so than even he realises and I am grateful to him and all the House staff, including those in the Library and the Public Bill Office, who have enabled the progress so far of this piece of legislation. Without Government support, this Bill would have gone nowhere; private Members’ Bills get nowhere without Government support. When I went to see the Prime Minister, he suddenly got what I was trying to do, understood it, supported it, and made sure that Ministers supported it, so I am very grateful to him for his incredible support. I have even had a note from him congratulating me on getting to this stage, so he watches what is going on. I am also grateful to those on the Opposition Front Bench. The shadow Minister gave a very supportive speech on Second Reading in November and demonstrated solidarity with this important cause.

From the start of this process, as a ten-minute rule Bill in the Session before last, via Second Reading and Committee, there have been simply too many parliamentary supporters for me to name individually, but I wish to thank my colleagues on the International Development Committee, including the Chair, the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion). She cannot be here today, but she has been a passionate advocate for the cause throughout the process. I also wish to thank, along with many others, the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma), who has been a constant source of support. He never hesitated when I asked, “Will you support this?” He said, “Yes” immediately. Like many of the best achievements in the House, this has truly been a cross-party effort.

Finally, I wish to place on record once again my gratitude to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid). As Members will know, he was drawn in the ballot for the private Members’ Bills. I have never been drawn in the ballot, but he was on his first time of entering. I was so delighted when he was appointed to the Government as then he could not take up his place, and he graciously gave up his slot to me rather than turn down the job. Without that gesture, the Bill might not have got here today. It only remains for me to say thank you and good luck to Baroness Sugg, who has watched from the Gallery throughout today and will steer the Bill through the other place. I can think of no more appropriate champion for it and I am delighted to place it in her capable hands. Let us put a stop to child marriage once and for all.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.