𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

“Big hats, hot sex and don’t care energy” sounds like a line written for a young character in a dodgy rom-com about to embark on a Netflix-worthy summer adventure. Except this time, it was used as a descriptor for what The Guardian heralded as “Hot Divorcee Summer”. Those words make us cringe because they make us think of bad Hollywood writers, but also because Hollywood’s own celebrities beg to differ.

Maybe it’s my age group coming into their first wedding-heavy summers, but it’s hard not to take notice of some of the world’s biggest stars choosing to make 2026 the all-time “Marriage Summer”.

Between Ronaldo, Taylor Swift, Travis Kelce, Tom Holland, Zendaya, Dua Lipa and Callum Turner all heading to the altar, and bringing a combined 1,291,700,000,000 Instagram followers with them on the journey, the public would be hard-pressed to think that marriage is over.

Here’s the catch. Under the radar, Labour’s cohabitation reforms are set to extend a “marriage-lite” status to unmarried couples who live together for three years or have a child.

What they don’t realise is that the reforms flatten the very thing worth celebrating. You can’t recognise the benefits of marriage (stability, legal clarity, shared commitment) without recognising that the act of choosing to commit, not simply the passing of time or having a child, is what makes marriage meaningful and attractive in the first place.

The absurdity of the proposals is almost comedic. Nothing says romance less than waking up on a weekday morning to a calendar notification on your phone, reminding you that it’s been three years since you moved in together, only to realise that your girlfriend or boyfriend now has a legal claim over your assets.

Equally, nothing says Black Mirror more than being dragged through court to fend off a former housemate of three years, pointing to photos of you at parties together, suggesting that you were romantically involved.

The Centre for Social Justice’s latest report, Finnishing Marriage, shows just how foolish these reforms could be. Looking to Finland, which introduced similar cohabitation reforms in 2011, analysis suggests that if England and Wales had introduced an equivalent reform in 2011, there could have been over 110,000 fewer marriages between 2012 and 2023, with almost 25,000 fewer marriages in 2023 alone.

Celebrity culture is currently celebrating commitment by choice. Cohabitation reforms risk couples coasting into a marriage-like state without encouraging them to commit at all.

By championing marriage, politicians could ride high on the coattails of those much more loved and respected in the public eye than themselves. Instead, ministers are trying to find a middle ground, creating all sorts of new issues in the process. Gen Z don’t need convincing. They’re scrolling through highlight reels of their favourite footballers, musicians and actors, choosing marriage and thinking it looks rather good. The Government has a ready-made cultural tailwind, and it’s about to fumble it in favour of a legal fudge nobody asked for.