• • Marriages and registered Civil Partnerships come with a ready-made package of rights and responsibilities prescribed by the law. Other cohabitants, whether heterosexual or of the same sex, have no such protection.

• The myth of the common law marriage is just that - a myth. As a result, in the absence of a binding agreement, on the breakdown of the relationship neither party has any claim to be maintained by the other despite what has happened in the past and for however long. Similarly the property in which they live belongs to the party whose name is on the deeds unless the other party can prove a contrary intention. Even if the property is in joint names it is shared on strict common law principles and not under the more flexible and fair approach of the Family Court.
  
  A dramatic demonstration of this was Mrs Melissa Miller who had refused to cohabit with Mr Miller unless he married her, which he did. When they divorced five years later the court awarded her a total of £5 million. Had they not been married she would have got nothing in the absence of a cohabitation agreement!

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