§ Lord Lester of Herne Hillasked Her Majesty's Government:
When they intend to introduce legislation to remove inconsistencies in the United Kingdom's family law provisions so as to enable them to ratify the Seventh Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights. [HL1456]
§ The Lord Chancellor (Lord Irvine of Lairg)In the White Paper which preceded the Human Rights Act, the Government made clear their commitment to ratifying the Seventh Protocol of the ECHR. In order to ratify this protocol, the Government need to abolish or equalise three minor rules of law in England and Wales which treat husbands and wives unequally and which are therefore incompatible with Article 5 of the Protocol. This change will require primary legislation. The Government will introduce the necessary legislation when parliamentary time allows. Similar rules to the three rules in question also exist in Northern Ireland. Two of them form part of the subject matter of a consultation paper which will be published shortly by the Law Reform Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland. Ultimately, legislation will be within the competence of the Northern Ireland Assembly. There is also one other minor rule of law in Scotland which is incompatible with Article 5. Legislation to change this will be within the competence of the Scottish Parliament.