The term ‘marriage’ needs to be untangled

Rebecca Steinfeld (37) and Charles Keidan (41) have a moral objection to marriage. They’ve been together since 2010, have two very small children, but haven’t tied the knot. This, they say, is because the law doesn’t offer a knot they’re comfortable tying. ‘Charlie and I see each other as partners already in life, and we want to have the status of being partners in law,’ says Rebecca. They hold (and you may agree or disagree but it’s not a crazy view) that the concept described by the word ‘marriage’ is asymmetrical between the man and the woman, and inextricably tangled with religion and with cultural attitudes this couple (and others) may not share.

So in 2014 they tried to register a civil partnership at Chelsea Town Hall, but were told such partnerships were for same-sex couples only. They went to law. Their challenge was that section 1(1) of the 2004 Civil Partnership Act — ‘a relationship between two people of the same sex’ — contravened their reading of the European Convention on Human Rights, so (they argued) they were being discriminated against.