The Family Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Northern Ireland) Order 1984

• Citation: S.I. 1984/1984 (N.I.)
• Sections: 8

Section 1 Title and commencement

(1) This Order may be cited as the Family Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Northern Ireland) Order 1984.

(2) Parts I and III and Part IV (except Article 21(1) insofar as it gives effect to Part I of Schedule 2) shall come into operation on the expiration of the period of two months from the day on which the Order is made.

Para.(3) rep. by 1998 NI 6

Section 2 General interpretation

The Interpretation Act (Northern Ireland) 1954 shall apply to Article 1 and the following provisions of this Order as it applies to a Measure of the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Section 15 Engagements to marry not enforceable at law

(1) An agreement between two persons to marry one another shall not have effect as a contract giving rise to legal rights and no action shall lie for breach of such an agreement whatever the law applicable to the agreement.

(2) This Article shall have effect in relation to agreements entered into before the commencement of this Article, except that it shall not affect any action begun before that commencement.

Section 16 Property of engaged couples

(1) Where an agreement to marry is terminated, any rule of law relating to the rights of husbands and wives in relation to property in which either or both has or have a beneficial interest shall apply in relation to any property in which either or both of the parties to the agreement had a beneficial interest while the agreement was in force, as it applies in relation to property in which a husband and wife has a beneficial interest.

(2) Where an agreement to marry is terminated, section 17 of the Married Women's Property Act 1882 and section 3 of the Law Reform (Husband and Wife) Act (Northern Ireland) 1964 (power of judge of the High Court or a county court to settle disputes between husband and wife about property) shall apply, as if the parties were married, to any dispute between them, or to any claim by one of them in relation to property in which either or both had a beneficial interest while the agreement was in force; but an application made by virtue of this Article to the judge under the said section 17, as originally enacted or as extended by the said section 3, shall be made within three years of the termination of the agreement.

Section 17 Gifts between engaged couples

(1) A party to an agreement to marry who make a gift of property to the other party to the agreement on the condition (express or implied) that it shall be returned if the agreement is terminated shall not be prevented from recovering the property by reason only of his having terminated the agreement.

(2) The gift of an engagement ring shall be presumed to be an absolute gift; this presumption may be rebutted by proving that the ring was given on the condition, express or implied, that it should be returned if the marriage did not take place for any reason.

Section 18 Prohibited degrees of relationship

(1) A marriage solemnized between a person and any person mentioned in the list in Part 1 of the following Table , is void:

PART I Prohibited degrees of relationship

PART II Degrees of affinity referred to in paragraphs (2A) and (2B)

PART III ...

(2) In that Table—

(a) any reference to an adoptive relationship or a former adoptive relationship is to a relationship which arises or arose in consequence of—

(i) an order authorising an adoption made (whether before or after the commencement of this Article) in any part of the United Kingdom, in the Isle of Man or in any of the Channel Islands, or

(ii) a foreign adoption as defined in section 4(3) of the Adoption (Hague Convention) Act (Northern Ireland) 1969;

(b) any reference to a sibling includes one of the half blood as well as of the whole blood;

(c) in Part II, any reference to a relationship which is one of affinity is to a relationship deduced through a marriage or civil partnership which has been terminated by dissolution or by death;

(d) any reference to a person of a particular relationship includes a person who would rank as being of that relationship if he, or some other person through whom the relationship is deduced, had been born legitimate.

(2A) Subject to paragraph (2B), a marriage solemnized between a person and any person mentioned in the list in Part 2 of that Table , is void.

(2B) Any such marriage as is mentioned in paragraph (2A) is not void by reason only of affinity if both the parties to the marriage have attained the age of 21 at the time of the marriage and the younger party has not at any time before attaining the age of 18 been a child of the family in relation to the other party.

(2C) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(2D) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(2DA) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(2DB) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(2DC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(2E) In this Article “child of the family”, in relation to any person, means a child who has lived in the same household as that person and been treated by that person as a child of his family.

(3) A marriage between person not within the degrees of relationship to which paragraph (1) or (2A) applies or a marriage to which paragraph (2B) applies is void, if either of those persons is at the time of the marriage domiciled in a country other than Northern Ireland and under the law of that country there cannot be a valid marriage between them because of their relationship to each other.

Section 19 Repeal of Marriage Act (Ireland) 1725, section iv

Section iv of the Marriage Act (Ireland) 1725 (which, for the removal of doubts, provided that a consummated marriage is not void because of an unconsummated precontract, and which is obsolete) shall cease to have effect.

Section 21 Amendments, repeals and savings

Para. (1)—Amendments

Para. (2)—Repeals

(3) The repeals in Schedule 3 do not—

(a) apply in any case where an action for breach of promise of marriage was begun before the commencement of Part III; or

(b) affect any marriage contracted before 18th April 1979 which by virtue of Article 61(1) of the Matrimonial Causes (Northern Ireland) Order 1978 continued to be void.

(4) Nothing in this Article or in Part III affects the validity of any marriage.

(5) Nothing in this Article or in Part III affects any right, title, estate, interest, will, claim, payment, commutation, composition, discharge, settlement or other thing, or the devolution or distribution of any property which, by virtue of section 2 of the Deceased's Wife's Sister's Marriage Act 1907, was not affected by the Marriage (Prohibited Degrees of Relationship) Acts (Northern Ireland) 1907 to 1949.