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Marriage Licences

Answer

Prior to 1 January 2004, all civil marriages were carried out either by registrar's certificate or registrar's licence but separate statistics are not available for each form of authority. Table 1 gives the total number of civil marriages by local government district between 2000 and 2003.New marriage legislation introduced from 1 January 2004 provided for universal civil preliminaries with a schedule issued by the registrar constituting the authority for all marriages, religious or civil, to take place. Table 2 gives the number of marriages carried out by schedule and the number of civil marriages by schedule by local government district in 2004. In addition, table 2 gives the number of civil marriages that took place in 2004, under the previous legislation.

Table 1: Total number of civil marriages by local government district, 2000 to 2003
Local government district	2000	2001	2002	2003
Antrim	59	60	67	46
Ards	86	80	82	75
Armagh	47	41	69	80
Ballymena	59	60	71	86
Ballymoney	22	24	14	24
Banbridge	48	43	63	54
Belfast	502	490	463	485
Carrickfergus	68	69	81	76
Castlereagh	73	80	91	96
Coleraine	85	92	114	111
Cookstown	12	15	21	18
Craigavon	86	85	84	89
Derry	95	95	104	124
Down	53	45	63	48
Dungannon	23	22	20	20
Fermanagh	38	57	42	43
Larne	39	31	41	42
Limavady	20	15	22	20
Lisburn	88	118	176	160
Magherafelt	20	9	22	20
Moyle	8	8	8	13
Newry and Mourne	67	44	45	65
Newtownabbey	77	88	102	105
North Down	181	173	207	195
Omagh	34	24	20	25
Strabane	20	13	21	14
Northern Ireland	1,910	1,881	2,113	2,134

Table 2: Total number of marriages carried out by schedule, the number of civil marriages by schedule, and the number of civil marriages under the previous legislation, by local government district, 2004
Local government district	All marriages by schedule	Civil marriages by schedule	Civil marriages under previous legislation
Antrim	185	57	3
Ards	231	78	4
Armagh	285	89	1
Ballymena	292	108	9
Ballymoney	109	27	4
Banbridge	147	41	1
Belfast	1,422	699	29
Carrickfergus	179	90	5
Castlereagh	172	71	3
Coleraine	294	109	4
Cookstown	186	29	1
Craigavon	333	88	5
Derry	480	143	4
Down	294	76	6
Dungannon	253	21	0
Fermanagh	349	85	4
Larne	161	36	0
Limavady	145	19	2
Lisburn	425	167	13
Magherafelt	198	9	0
Moyle	100	13	1
Newry and Mourne	495	105	4
Newtownabbey	243	62	5
North Down	478	235	13
Omagh	249	29	1
Strabane	134	14	2
Northern Ireland	7,839	2,500	124

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

24144; 439 c421-2W;439 c421-2W

Session

2005-06

Subjects

Marriage Northern Ireland Registration of births, deaths, marriages and civil partnerships

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk