The Government’s public consultation on whether forced marriage should be made a criminal offence in the UK will close in March 2012. The results of the consultation will be published shortly after the publication of a new Demos report on the topic: Ending Forced Marriage. 

Criminalisation of forced marriage is a contentious issue, with successive governments failing to develop a coherent programme to tackle the problem. During our research, Demos spoke to people who worked both with the victims of forced marriage, and in communities where forced marriage takes place. We also conducted a meta-analysis of research into attitudes to forced marriage and looked at initiatives designed to tackle the practice at home and abroad.

Whilst opinion about criminalisation ran high on both sides of the debate, the one strongest finding from our research was an overwhelming consensus that criminalisation would not in and of itself work to end forced marriage. Whilst criminalising forced marriage in the UK might send a stronger message to communities that it is a practice that is not tolerated, there is a risk that changing the law might deter victims from reporting their situation – after all, no one wants to send their mum and dad to jail.

The real problem with the UK’s approach is a lack of consistency, and a failure to square what we practice at home with what we preach abroad. DfID spends millions of pounds annually, designing and funding holistic, community-based interventions to eradicate the practice of forced marriage in places like Africa and South Asia. In the UK, charities delivering holistic, community based interventions often receive no funding at all.

Funding for BAME activist groups – the places where, as our research shows, the most effective interventions take place – is notoriously hard to come by. In addition, during 2011, charities in the UK received a £110 million cut in funding. Whilst the Government’s focus on eradicating forced marriage is welcome, criminalisation is not enough. In order to tackle forced marriage, nuanced legislation and sustained funding need to go hand in hand. Consistency, not criminalisation, is the order of the day.

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