---

International Women's Day

I am sorry, I will not. We need to deal with cultural expectations of duty and honour and work with communities, schools and agencies to change attitudes and behaviour towards women and their right to choose their own partner. Good progress has been made in the past three years using the civil law. It would be a travesty if such work were undone. The criminal law may punish the perpetrator, but it does little to protect the victim and can often cause no end of collateral damage. In Scotland, recent forced marriage legislation already criminalises breach of an order. We therefore have a prime opportunity to pause, observe and review, and avoid creating yet another criminal offence, which could so easily defeat the object of our very best intentions.