Almost half of people in England and Wales believe that ‘common law marriage’ exists. It does not. However long a couple has lived together, or whether they have children together, cohabitation does not give them the same legal status as a married couple.
The Ministry of Justice’s consultation, A Fairer End to Relationships, published in June 2026, proposes new rights and protections for some cohabiting couples when a relationship ends. For cohabitants, it considers both separation and death, but it does not propose making cohabitation equivalent to marriage. The proposed rights would remain deliberately narrower.
What the law provides now
At present, a separating cohabiting couple has no equivalent to the financial provision available on divorce. There is no general family law power allowing the court to redistribute their property, share pensions or order one former partner to maintain the other simply because the relationship has ended.
Disputes about the family home are instead generally determined by property and trust law. Where a home is owned by one partner, the other may have to establish that they have a beneficial interest in it, for example through financial contributions or evidence of a shared understanding about ownership.
That distinction can have significant consequences. One partner may have reduced their hours, earnings or pension provision to care for children or support the household without acquiring a corresponding interest in property owned by the other. Those contributions do not currently give the court the same broad powers that are available when a marriage ends.
The consequences can be particularly serious where one partner is already financially vulnerable. The consultation identifies domestic abuse, including economic abuse, as a particular concern, recognising that financial dependence can make it harder for someone to leave an abusive relationship without facing significant financial insecurity.
Separate provision remains available for children, including child maintenance and applications under Schedule 1 of the Children Act 1989, but those remedies are concerned with provision for the child rather than a wider financial settlement between the former partners.
A framework, but not the same one
These new proposals would create a new route to financial provision for adults aged 18 or over who have lived together in a committed, romantic, long-term relationship. For couples without children, that route would open after three years of cohabitation. Where there is a child of the family, no minimum period is proposed. This would include not only a biological child of both partners, but also a child whom they have treated as part of the family, while friends, relatives and housemates sharing a home would remain outside the scheme.
Those who meet these requirements would be able to apply for financial provision if they separate, with the court able to make lump sum, property adjustment and pension sharing orders. However, the availability of those orders would not put cohabitants in the same position as divorcing spouses. The sharing principle would not apply and there would be no default expectation that assets should be divided equally. Instead, each person would retain what they legally own, with the court intervening where necessary to meet defined financial needs.
The proposed test for meeting those needs would also be deliberately limited. The focus would be on essential requirements such as housing, income and pension needs rather than discretionary or luxury expenditure. In deciding what provision is required, the court could consider each partner’s earning capacity and financial resources, alongside their age, any physical or mental disability and the length of the relationship. Where there are children and the available resources are limited, their needs would take priority.
The same emphasis on limiting financial dependence can be seen in the approach to maintenance. Regular payments between former partners would be possible where an ongoing need could not otherwise be met, including in circumstances involving serious illness or disability, but they would be much more limited than on divorce. The intention is to bring continuing financial ties to an end as soon as it is just and reasonable to do so, rather than create an open-ended obligation.
There would also be a time limit for making a claim. An application for financial provision would have to be made within two years of the relationship ending.
The right to opt out
Whilst the suggested protections would apply automatically to couples who meet the requirements, they would not be compulsory. Couples would be able to agree between them that the new rules should not apply in their case.
That choice would need to be properly informed. The Government proposes safeguards around any decision to opt out so that one partner cannot simply be pressured into giving up protection they would otherwise have had. Any agreement would also leave a child’s existing rights to maintenance and financial provision untouched.
The principle is an important one. The proposals are intended to give qualifying cohabitants financial protection of a kind that is not currently available, while preserving both the distinction between cohabitation and marriage and the ability of couples to make a different choice for themselves.
Death changes the calculation
The consultation also considers what happens when a cohabiting relationship ends through death.
Under the current intestacy rules, a surviving cohabitant has no automatic entitlement to inherit from a partner who dies without a Will, regardless of how long they have lived together. A surviving partner may be able to bring a claim under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975, but that requires a separate application rather than giving them an automatic share of the estate.
The consultation proposes changing that position by giving some cohabitants an automatic right to inherit when their partner dies without a Will, together with a corresponding right to administer the estate. The requirements would not necessarily mirror those proposed on separation. The Government has not yet decided how long a couple would need to have lived together before inheritance rights arose and is seeking views on the appropriate period.
Earlier Law Commission proposals suggested five years where the couple had no child together and two years where they did. The question is significant because creating an automatic entitlement for a surviving cohabitant may change what passes to other members of the deceased’s family, including children from previous relationships.
What has not changed
For now, the legal position for cohabiting couples remains unchanged. The consultation closed on 14th August 2026, and the responses will inform the form and timing of any legislation that follows.
The proposals would narrow some of the legal distance between marriage and cohabitation, but they are not intended to remove it. That distinction runs throughout the consultation. Greater protection is proposed where a relationship ends, but without giving cohabitants the same financial position as spouses.
Until any reforms take effect, couples still need to make their own provision. A cohabitation agreement can record how property and financial responsibilities are to be dealt with, although these agreements are not automatically legally binding and their enforceability depends on how they are drafted. An up-to-date Will remains equally important because, as the law stands, cohabitants have no automatic right to inherit under the intestacy rules.
