One of my roles on Cornwall Council is to chair the Fifth Nation Members’ Working Group, which was previously known as the Cornish National Minority Working Group. The work of this cross-party panel is quite wide-ranging and our terms of reference focus on achieving greater recognition of Cornish nationhood. We seek to promote and celebrate the national minority status of the Cornish, support the Cornish language, and strengthen Cornwall’s links with the other Celtic nations and the global Cornish diaspora. We also make regular representations to central government about their obligations to (i) the Cornish through the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, and to (ii) the Cornish language through the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.
The working group has just responded to a UK Government consultation titled “Tying the Knot: Reforming Wedding Law in England and Wales.” It follows the Law Commission’s 2022 report “Celebrating Marriage: A New Weddings Law,” which concluded that the existing laws were “inconsistent and complicated, inefficient, unfair and needlessly restrictive.”
The consultation document does actually reference the use of languages “other than English or Welsh” and gives the example “such as Cornish.”
Our response welcomed this shift in approach, and we have expressed our support for couples to be “permitted to make legally binding marriage vows in the Cornish language” and that “equivalent provision be introduced for civil partnerships.”
Indeed, we have noted that such proposals “represent an important and positive step in recognising and supporting the use of the Cornish language within public and civic life. For many Cornish speakers, the ability to make legally binding marriage vows in their own language carries profound cultural, personal and emotional significance. Marriage and civil partnership ceremonies are among life’s most important milestones, and individuals should have the opportunity to mark such occasions through the language that forms part of their identity, heritage and community.”
Given that people in Scotland can get legally married in Scottish Gaelic and people in Northern Ireland can get legally married in Irish, it would be unjust if this provision is not extended to speakers of Cornish.
It is also our understanding, however, that legal documentation would continue to be produced only in English or Welsh. This creates an inconsistency whereby a couple may be able to enter into a marriage or civil partnership through the medium of Cornish, but would be unable to receive official documentation in the same language. We have therefore requested that marriage and civil partnership schedules and related statutory paperwork can be issued in Cornish and have the same legal status as English-language documentation.
Article published in the Cornish Guardian (23rd September 2026) and West Briton newspapers (24th September 2026)