Civil Partnerships: "Divorcing"

THE number of gay couples “divorcing” has soared as the seven-year itch hits civil partnerships. Following a boom in 2006 after the ceremonies were introduced, the past year has seen a 20 per cent rise in split-ups.

The rate of dissolutions in England and Wales rose from 663 in 2011 to 794 last year. The number of new UK civil partnerships was also up to 7,037, a 3.6 per cent rise on 2011. This compares with a peak of 9,648 in 2006.

Alison Hawes, a family lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, said: “It’s expected that these relationships will follow the general trends of heterosexual marriage and divorce.

“It is a common generalisation that there is a seven-year itch when relationships supposedly become more difficult. The statistics show that the first 10 years are the most vulnerable in a marriage, and the same seems to be true of civil partnerships.”

Mirroring heterosexual divorces, women were most likely to opt for splitting, with almost six out of 10 dissolutions involving lesbian couples, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics. Since civil partnerships were introduced, a total of 60,454 gay and lesbian couples have opted to form one...

Daily Express. 

Most of the nationals went for this angle - the rise in dissolutions.
Possible Express subtext: "Hurrah! Told you so..." 

Though surely much of this can be accounted for by the simple fact that civil partnerships have only been going seven years, and the more that there are, the more "divorces" there will be.

[Fagburn was crap at maths at school, so if any boffins out there think I've felched this up, please let me know].
[Edit: The Times noted more soberly on Thursday, the rise "is no surprise and mirrors the general trends in divorce, with couples being most vulnerable in their first ten years of marriage, family lawyers said this week"].
The Independent emphasised; Lesbian couples twice as likely as gay men to end civil partnerships...

But that did let them illustrate it with a photo of two fruity lesbians snogging...

Gay Star News managed to spin it into good news; UK gay civil partner rates hint marriage will be a hit.
Which is equally valid, I guess.
(Though, for the record, the original government estimates in 2003 for people who'd be living in civil partnerships by 2050 was 850,000, admittedly pretty daft, it was later downgraded to about 90,000, which GSN cite - so their line about the current rates "soaring far beyond original government expectations" isn't strictly true).

And well done to the taboo-busting Express for illustrating their story with the photo above of two fellas together in a bed. 

Two fellas!!! IN A BED!
Thankfully they managed to find one in the stock photo library where they're both wearing t-shirts, lest we all become driven wild by disgust and/or desire.

Their four (4) readers' comments say, in full; "Weirdos", "Stomach churning", "They probably realise that it's a bit weird and it's about time they should get a proper boyfriend/girlfriend" and, "There is no such thing as same sex marriage and to say there is, is preposterous."

So now you know.