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9.21 pm
Mrs. Barbara Roche (Hornsey and Wood Green): This has been an extremely good, sober and serious debate and we have had high-quality contributions from all parts of the House. We all bring to the debate our own experiences. We are elected to serve by our constituents and, much as we like to think that we are elected for our own sakes, which I am sure we are in part, we are elected mainly to serve under our party political colours.
When we debate issues of this kind we bring to bear our own experiences, histories and backgrounds. We have experience as husbands, wives or parents and, of course, as members of families. There are probably no more important subjects to be discussed in this place than marriage and families. I am sure that there is broad consensus on that. As my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) said, families are the building blocks of society. The family is the unit that sustains us in time of trouble and it brings us joy, hope and comfort.
It must be the objective of every hon. Member from whatever party they come to do everything that they can to bolster families and to support and preserve the institution of marriage. Perhaps our most important aim is to do whatever we can to make sure that our children, the nation's children, are brought up to lead good and fulfilling lives and give something to society.
I have said that we have had high-quality contributions in the debate. There were some impressive personal testaments by hon. Members in all parts of the House and from different viewpoints. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Dame J. Knight) spoke movingly about the importance of children and about divorce. The hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Sir J. Wiggin) spoke from his own experiences, as did the hon. Member for Mid-Kent (Mr. Rowe) in a short but pertinent intervention. The right hon. Member for Oxford, West and Abingdon (Mr. Patten) spoke about the importance of reconciliation, a theme that hon. Members have returned to time and again. It comes as a surprise that, as originally presented in another place, the Bill did not mention reconciliation. That illustrates some of the confusion about this matter. It is one of the things that Labour Members intend to emphasise in Committee.
My hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell, South(Dr. Bray) mentioned the social context of marriage. That was echoed by my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood
(Mr. Tipping) who has a wealth of experience of working with children. He and my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton) put the context of the debate in terms of the stresses that are sometimes placed on families and that involve not so much the law, but social problems, unemployment and many other factors that are pertinent to marriage.
The hon. Member for Bournemouth, West(Mr. Butterfill) mentioned pension splitting and his support for that. There was an interesting debate about mediation. An interesting thing about this place, especially when we have important debates such as this one, is that we learn about the background of hon. Members. For example, my hon. Friends the Members for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Michie) and for Bristol, East (Ms Corston) and the hon. Member for Chislehurst (Mr. Sims) not only spoke with passion and enthusiasm about mediation, but clearly knew what they were talking about. Perhaps all hon. Members will agree that, sometimes, there is a tinge to speeches in this place which shows that Members may not know what they are talking about. That was certainly not the case in this debate. We all benefited from that. The Committee that considers the Bill will benefit from hon. Members' experience.
The hon. and learned Member for Burton(Sir I. Lawrence) and the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd) spoke about preparation for marriage, which is relevant. For those of us who enter into marriage, it is probably the most important decision that we make in our lives, yet preparation for it is often patchy and sometimes non-existent. Again, that theme is not dealt with in the Bill, but it will emerge when hon. Members discuss the matter in Committee.
My hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, East(Mr. Anderson) managed in a short time to put the whole question in context. He reminded me of the case of Wachtel v. Wachtel, which I dimly remember from my Bar exam days. What was good about his speech was that he placed his experience at the Bar at our disposal in telling us what the position was.
The aim of the Divorce Reform Act 1969 was to buttress rather than to undermine the stability of marriage, but, where marriages were thought to have irretrievably broken down, to provide a structure where they could end with minimum bitterness and acrimony. Unfortunately, that has not been the case. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, East said, the 1969 Act had one ground for the ending of the marriage: irretrievable breakdown. That is established by five facts. Three of the facts involve fault, but it was assumed--certainly by the House at the time--that the two years' separation fact would be the one mostly used.
As hon. Members on both sides of the House know, however, that is not the case. Seventy-five per cent. of all cases go on the facts of adultery and unreasonable behaviour. We know the reason for that: to have a quick divorce. Thirty-two per cent. of divorces are granted in under six months and 82 per cent. in under one year. The facts illustrate that the Act's two purposes, which I mentioned--to support marriage and to provide the appropriate structure where they had irretrievably broken down--are not being achieved by current legislation.
The one-year period provided for in the Bill will be subject to a free vote on both sides of the House, as will the removal of the concept of fault. The Bill moves away
from the sometimes adversarial nature of divorce towards mediation. I acted for both petitioners and respondents when I was at the Bar, so I have some experience of these matters. Both the solicitors' profession and the Bar have moved on and now the majority of solicitors and barristers recognise the importance of acting responsibly and in the interests of the family.
There is no doubt that our court structure is adversarial. Just as this House is based on adversarial lines, so is our court structure. The Bill moves away from that towards mediation. However, it cannot be stressed enough that mediation is not reconciliation; nor is it counselling. As we go through the Committee stage, we must keep returning to that point--and make no apology for doing so. We must ask some hard questions about the structure of mediation, the training required and the pattern throughout the country. Mediation is not an easy option; it is not something that the enthusiastic amateur can take on. We cannot simply talk about mediation and assume that it will be provided everywhere. Nor can we assume, as my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) said, that the structure exists to bring about mediation. It will require highly trained and skilled people. I shall listen closely to the Minister when he replies as I want to hear in detail about the preparations to bring that about.
I understand that there will be a number of pilot projects throughout the country. How will they be run? How will the people in those projects be trained? How will we provide for monitoring? How will we allow for regional variation? If we get it wrong, we could create something as unpalatable and unworkable as the Child Support Agency in its early stages. We will create something that will not work.
In Committee, we must examine how the practical structure will work. We must look at the practical experience of other countries such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand. We must look at best practice. Again, we need to ask hard questions about the information meetings. How will they be held? In what context will they be held? How will they safeguard privacy? How will we ensure that people feel comfortable in those meetings? How will we ensure that people go to them with the best possible attitude?
We must remember that mediation is not always suitable. Some cases, because of their complex nature or the particular facts involved, will not be appropriate for mediation. We must ensure that the need for independent legal advice in such cases is recognised. We want an assurance from the Minister that that legal advice will be available. We certainly do not want the Bill to result in a two-tier divorce system, with one remedy available for those rich enough to pay for it and another for those who are not. That is important.
As well as being members of our political parties, we all have another role as constituency Members of Parliament. Mention has already been made of the effects of marriage breakdown. We see them in our surgeries every week. We see the distress caused to families, the financial hardship and, most important, the distress caused to that group that we can never forget, our children--the most vulnerable people in our community. I say our children because we all have a responsibility for the
children in our society. We will need to ensure that during the Minister's reply and in Committee, those hard questions are answered.
An important part of the Bill deals with domestic violence, which is of course tackled by existing legislation, but in a very piecemeal fashion that sometimes makes it difficult for practitioners, and more importantly victims, who are overwhelmingly women, to seek help.
Together with other hon. Members, I was extremely proud to be a member of the Select Committee on Home Affairs, which reported earlier this Session on domestic violence. The most important thing that the House can say about domestic violence is that it is a crime that will be punished by the full weight of the law; that the House takes it seriously; and that the courts and the police take it very seriously. It is important that we consider the Select Committee's conclusions, so I should like to quote a passage from them.
Violent crime of whatever description is completely abhorrent to the House and society. The unique thing that distinguishes domestic violence from any other violent crime is that it occurs in the very place where we are entitled to feel most secure, safe and protected. For too many of our citizens, especially women and children, the home is a place of fear and violence, where they feel totally unprotected. I am very glad that, in part IV, the issue of domestic violence has been introduced. I am sure that we shall be having detailed discussions of the proposals in Committee.
There has been a great deal of discussion in another place about pension splitting. It is clearly an issue of fairness and equity. The pension built up during a marriage is obviously a family asset. Like the matrimonial home, it needs to be taken into consideration on divorce. I should like to pay a very full-hearted tribute to my noble Friend Baroness Hollis for the campaign that she waged in another place.
Although we welcome the Government's announcement that they will not oppose clause 15, I should like to hear from the Minister--the point was echoed by other hon. Members, certainly the hon. Member for Bournemouth, West--the reason why the time scale for introducing the Green Paper is so dilatory. Why are we talking about June and July? We know that a great deal of preparatory work has been done. Surely the sooner the Green Paper is published and the sooner we can consider some of the complex technical issues the better. We welcome the Government's announcement, but we want to hear more. We certainly want to hear more assurances about the time scale and about how the measure is to be implemented.
"We were very impressed by the commitment of many of those we encountered in this inquiry: those who work directly in refuges and with the Women's Aid movement, police officers, probation officers, Crown Prosecutors and others. We should now like to see the energy and zeal displayed by the best in each service becoming common to all. Awareness of the issue must be spread throughout the relevant practitioners in the criminal and civil justice system, and it must be complemented by the full-hearted commitment from the centre of Government to guarantee that most basic of a citizen's rights: the one of living a life where violence is not feared and individual dignity is respected."
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