Early estimates indicated as few as 3% of gay people would use the Civil Partnership Act, yet a recent survey found that more than half of lawyers in same-sex relationships are considering making their union official, writes Jon Robins

Members of the legal profession are not known for letting their hearts rule their heads. So it is revealing to discover that, according to research by the Lesbian and Gay Lawyers Association (LAGLA), more than half of lawyers in same-sex relationships are planning to tie the knot and register their relationships under the Civil Partnership Act 2004.


Sarah Bourke, a 33-year-old barrister who works at Brent Law Centre in north London, has already taken the plunge. She met her partner, Tess Joseph, more than a decade ago. ‘If we had been able to do it 11 years ago, then we would have,’ says Ms Bourke, who became one of the first to get hitched under the new regime when she and her partner registered their relationship on 21 December at Camden Town Hall. It was the first date possible after giving the 15 days’ notice required by law. ‘It is about celebrating our relationship rather than the financial side of things,’ she explains.


While the LAGLA survey is an unambiguous message of approval from gay lawyers for the new legislation, Ms Bourke also sounds a familiar note of disappointment. She thinks the government ‘wimped out severely’ by not calling partnerships ‘civil marriage’. As far as the couple was concerned, their big day was their ‘wedding’, and that would have been the right word to describe it. ‘Tess wanted the big kosher-catered Jewish wedding,’ she says. ‘But I put my foot down at the prospect of a marquee in the garden for 250 guests.’


The LAGLA results represent ‘a huge endorsement’ of civil partnerships, reckons Andrea Woelke, LAGLA’s chairman and principal at the new London firm Alternative Family Law. According to the group’s research, more than nine out of ten of its members are in steady relationships, and of that number, only 22% have ruled out registering as a civil partner.


Mr Woelke points out only 30% of the heterosexual adult population gets married and, according to the government’s own figures, it was anticipated that the take-up of civil partnership in the gay community could be as low as 3%. ‘We were amazed to discover that, despite professional work involving the breakdown of relationships, romance seems to be triumphing over professional scepticism,’ he says.


LAGLA claims to have left its own imprint on the landmark legislation. James Carroll, a family law solicitor at the London law firm Russell-Cooke and the group’s joint social secretary, reckons that its contribution was second only in size to the pressure group Stonewall. ‘We were in a unique place to respond as lawyers, to say this would or would not work, because so many of us are family lawyers,’ he says. He claims a couple of provisions that would have not been there but for LAGLA’s input, such as the ability to register partnerships overseas in embassies.


A mini industry has quickly grown up to cater for gay weddings, and, unsurprisingly, divorce lawyers have not been slow off the mark to tap into a potential new, cash-rich client base. ‘I have already trained more solicitors about civil partnerships than there are going to be divorces in the first two years,’ notes Mr Woelke.


By far the largest proportion of LAGLA’s membership specialise in family law. However, there are only a handful of firms that target gay clients as part of their wider marketing efforts, such as the London firms BurtonWoods and immigration specialists Wesley Gryk. LAGLA secretary Haema Sundram, a partner at north London law firm Lynch & Co, reckons her client base is 70% lesbian and gay, and 30% straight. She reports ‘lots of inquiries’ about pre-registration agreements and same-sex adoption under the Adoption and Children Act 2002, which came into force over the New Year. ‘I do not think it is the norm for heterosexual people to take advice before going into marriage, and I guess that must be a cultural thing,’ she says. ‘We’re getting people who are interested in going into civil partnerships, and by the end of next year we will have people interested in getting out of it. In the middle of next year there’ll be people who will be seeking to adopt children.’


But is there anything wrong about lawyers, gay or straight, jumping on the latest bandwagon? ‘There is a concern among some of us on the LAGLA committee that some people may hold themselves out as civil partnership experts without knowing much about the issues,’ warns Rachel Woodd, LAGLA’s joint social secretary and a solicitor at a London firm Osbornes. ‘I’m not saying that you have to be gay to be allowed to represent people that are going to be affected by this, but there are some people who have just read an article and might then claim to be experts.’


‘From the point of view of a gay person, the more people that realise what’s happening and make whatever changes necessary within their own practices, then the better,’ says Ms Sundram. ‘It can only be right that every family lawyer in the country needs to get to grips with the changes, and needs to develop an awareness of dealing with gay clients. That can only help.’


Is it an advantage to be gay when advising on such matters? ‘In the past I have found that gay people going through particular family difficulties have found it easier to speak to somebody who is gay,’ Ms Sundram says. ‘For example, if someone is leaving a heterosexual marriage or relationship and they have children, it is easier to be more open when it is apparent that they will have empathy.’


Ms Woodd agrees: ‘From my own perspective, I think I’d have more understanding just because I know the issues they have to face more personally… People outside the gay community might not understand the finer issues of, for example, donor insemination, or more stereotypical areas, such as two gay guys splitting up and rowing over the contents of their wardrobe.’


David Allison, a partner at the London law firm Family Law in Partnership, has started a group, or ‘queer pod’, for gay lawyers. It unites the two most fashionable areas of family law at the moment by applying the principles of the collaborative law approach to civil partnerships in the drafting of relationship agreements.


‘I thought that gay couples would want to know about what amounts to new rights, and they will be more interested in knowing what lawyers think about them than straight people would be, who understandably may fall in love and get married without thinking so much about the legal implications,’ Mr Allison says. Although he has completed two pre-registration agreements, he is not yet convinced that the profession’s anticipation of a deluge of interest ‘has been borne out by reality’.


There are still only 170 members of LAGLA. Does that suggest that the strait-laced legal world makes it a difficult environment for gay lawyers to come out? Apparently not. Most LAGLA members have been open about their sexuality throughout their careers, without encountering serious discrimination. For example, Ms Woodd met her partner when she was doing her training contract with a firm in Hayes in west London, ‘perhaps not known as the most tolerant of areas’. She recalls: ‘We were treated fantastically well. I have always been out. I’m not really the pink flag-waving type. Your sexuality is not the most important thing about you, but I just think you should be open and honest about it because it means life is easier for you.’


Mr Allison recalls working for one partner at a former firm who was ‘blatantly homophobic’, and his response to an invitation to support a Stonewall campaign on equalising the age of consent. ‘I sent an e-mail throughout the firm saying there were cards available if anyone wants to sign in support of the campaign,’ he says. ‘He sent a reply, copied to everyone, that “most of us wanted to protect our children from that sort of stuff”.’ It was ‘a bit unpleasant’, Mr Allison remembers, but because he was ‘in such a minority within the firm, it wasn’t a problem and everyone else was outraged’. He adds: ‘Rather bizarrely, we ended up getting on reasonably well in the end.’


For many gay and lesbian lawyers, the advent of civil partnerships is a moment of personal significance more than professional, as the LAGLA research indicates. ‘My parents are always asking me whether we will [become civil partners] – almost every week,’ says Ms Woodd. ‘If everything continues to go as well in my relationship as it is doing now, I will,’ she says.


Mr Allison describes himself as ‘firmly single’ and has no plans to register. Nor do any of his friends, many of whom are not professionals and so, as he puts it, ‘inheritance tax issues are not such a big thing to them’. But he adds: ‘I am hugely supportive of civil partnerships and campaigned for the legislation to go through.’


Mr Carroll says his mother and her partner intend to be among the first lesbian couples to get hitched in Northampton, and he will be giving her away. Will he be registering a civil partnership himself? ‘I am waiting to be asked,’ he says.


Jon Robins is a freelance journalist