UNMARRIED COHABITING COUPLES INTRO Flashcards
Why is the definition of cohabitation so complicated?
Because it covers such a wide variety of relationships/people
What did Baroness Hale say about the difference between cohabiting couples and married ones?
‘Marriage brings with it legal rights and obligations that unmarried couples do not have’
What case did Baroness Hale make statement ‘marriage brings with it legal rights and obligation that unmarried couples do not have’?
Re P 2008
What 4 categories does the research of BARLOW et al 2007 suggest cohabiting couples fall into?
1) Ideologues - long term couples with ideological objection to marriage
2) Romantics - Have intention to marry and see cohabitation as a long to commitment and step towards marriage
3) Pragmatists - Decision to not/get married based on financial or legal reasons
4) Uneven couples - Cannot agree to get married
Which academic splits cohabitant couples into 4 categories, romantics/ideologues/pragmatists/uneven couples?
Barlow et al 2007
How does the law treat cohabiting couples?
Save for very few statutes, the pair might as well be strangers in the eyes of the law
Which case suggests criteria that should be taken into account when dealing with cohabiting couples?
KIMBER 2000
What criteria for dealing with cohabiting couples was suggested in KIMBER 2000?
I) Were parties living together under one roof?
II) Did they share tasks/duties in daily life - housework etc?
III) Does the relationship have stability and permanence?
IV) How were finances arranged?
V) Did they have children/how did parties react to other party’s children?
VI) Opinion of a reasonable person with normal perceptions looking at the couple’s life together
Has there been any statutory attempt to define cohabiting couples?
- > Yes
- > s144 Adoption and Children’s Act 2002
How did s144 of the Adoption and Children’s Act try to define cohabiting couples?
‘People living as partners in an enduring family relationship’ are able to adopt
Where is the more commonly used definition of cohabiting couples found?
S62(1) Family Law Act 1996
How does s62(1) FLA 1996 define cohabiting couples?
‘Living together as husband and wife or in an equivalent relationship’
Is there a difference between rights of same and opposite sex unmarried couples?
No, 2 cases demonstrate this:
FITZPATRICK v STERLING HOUSING ASSOCIATION 1999
SS v M 2006
What was held in Fitzpatrick v Sterling Housing Association 1999
- Supreme Court accepted that a gay man had been accepted as family by his partners family
What was said in SS v M 2006?
- A same sex couple are just as capable of constituting a family as a heterosexual couple
- Lord Nicholls
