In the United Kingdom, the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act (DDSA), enacted in 2020, came into force on April 6 and it legally regulates the breakdown of marriages in England and wales.
This law makes important changes to divorce proceedings and bases the technical aspects essentially on the end of the system based on the charge of responsibility for one or the other spouse. In fact, there is talk of “no-fault divorce”, that is, divorce without the attribution of guilt.
It is also called a quickie, i.e. a quick divorce, and in fact, as of today in Great Britain, spouses can end their marriage in about six months, without even having to state any reasons for separating. In the event that one of them disagrees, challenging the decision sanctioned by the judges would be quite complex.
Despite opposition in the past by some British law firms, which surprisingly considered the new legislation still excessively rigid, it is interesting to note the opinion of Colin Hart, president of the pro-family association Coalition for Marriage (C4M), who stated that he was extremely disappointed “[…] that the government has ignored all the data and strong arguments against speeding up the process, under the delusion that no-fault divorce will somehow prevent hurt feelings and bad break ups. They will not.”
According to The Christian Institute, previously, in order to obtain a divorce, spouses had to prove that their marriage “had irretrievably broken down through either adultery, unreasonable behavior, desertion, or separation for two years with their spouse’s consent, or five years without.” Colin Hart fears that easy and no-fault divorce will only lead to a sharp increase in the number of break ups.