Years ago, before I ever wrote a ceremony professionally, I was a guest at a wedding held in a vineyard. Excited to be a part of such an important moment, I had travelled to Melbourne, and was at the Red Hill Winery, on the Mornington Peninsula. It was breathtaking. Close to the sun setting over the ocean below us, with pristine rows of vines running off in every direction, the ceremony that followed felt nothing like any wedding I had been to before in England. It was totally relaxed, filled with love, light and laughter, and unmistakably, entirely about the two people getting married. Not a template where the names were changed, or as in my own case several years earlier, standing nervously with my husband to be amongst a huge group of wedding couples, patiently waiting our turn for the ten minute service at the Register Office.
At that time, there was nothing to compare with this freedom and the exhilaration of the setting itself.
I remember standing there thinking, this is what a wedding could be. That afternoon in 2002 planted a seed, and is a large part of why I became a celebrant
What I did not know yet, standing among the vines, was that in countries like Australia this way of marrying people already came with something the UK did not offee; legal recognition to go alongside the personal ceremony.
When I went looking for celebrant training in 2011, I found Terri Shanks, founder of the Fellowship of Professional Celebrants. Terri had trained in Australia under Dally Messenger III himself, the officiant widely credited with bringing personalised ceremonies to the Australian provinces from the 1970s onwards. Learning about that connection simply felt like a sign from the universe.
Elsewhere in the world, officiants were already writing ceremonies as personal as the one I witnessed that evening, and those ceremonies were also legally binding. No separate form, no register office appointment beforehand but simply one moment that was both true to the couple and confirmed their relationship in the eyes of the law.
That gap between what I saw was possible elsewhere and what the UK was offering couples in terms of choice, inclusivity, recognition and acknowledgement of different lifestyles, faith, and the importance of creating meaning through storytelling, has sat with me for most of my career.
Which is why, when I read that the government is finally consulting on modernising Marriage and changing the law so that in England and Wales, Celebrants can become authorised Officiants, and create the magic that I witnessed over 24 years ago in that beautiful vineyard.
This blog is about the changes that are being considered and you do have a say. The consultation is open to all, and I encourage couples, and anyone in the wedding industry and those who are already married and have a story to tell, to contribute to the questoins asked, and in particular to Chapter 6, which is about the role of Independent Celebrants like myself, as well as Humanists, in England and Wales. to be able to register Marriage.
What is actually happening
On 16 July 2026 the Ministry of Justice opened a public consultation called Tying the knot: reforming weddings law in England and Wales.
It is the first serious attempt to rewrite wedding law since 1836, which if you do the maths is genuinely older than the white wedding dress as a tradition. It closes on 24 September 2026, and unlike most government documents this one is written for anyone to respond to, not just lawyers, the clergy or faith organisations or civil servants.
That includes you, if you are planning a wedding, have already had one, or simply have an opinion on how this should work, particularly in terms of the officiant, the style, format, location, timing, time of day, length, content and of course the legal standing of such an occasion.
The bit that changes everything
Right now, your venue being licensed is what makes your wedding legal. Not your officiant, not the words you say to each other, the building. Which is a strange thing to sit with once you notice it. You could write the most personal, unscripted, entirely-you ceremony imaginable, and none of that is what makes the marriage real in the eyes of the law. A witnessed record does that, usually followed by a piece of paper and a certificate that arrives a little later in the post.
The proposal would change the current model from the “licensed venue” being the place where a legal marriage can take place, to a new modern model, with the registration and ceremony being created and led by an Authorised Officiant. This offers enormous choice for the location of the ceremony, which could be a public park area, a private garden, outside in nature amongst lakes, woods or on the beach as well as the thousands of previously licenced venues, as well as those which never held a licence. It will no longer be limited to a “licenced venue”. It will be totally bespoke, and include rituals with meaning and relevance, making it a unique ceremony for each couple.
That single change is the reason I am writing this.
Why I care about this more than most news stories I share
Somewhere in this consultation is a question asking whether independent celebrants, people like me, who do not sit within any particular religion, should be allowed to legally marry couples. Not just conduct the ceremony you actually remember, but make it the one that counts.
I have spent fifteen years writing ceremonies that are genuinely about the two people in front of me, over 600 of them now, and most of the couples I work with already knew, before they found me, that they wanted something that felt like them rather than something that felt like a template where only the names were changed. My ceremonies were symbolic, meaningful, honest, sincere and filled with storytelling, participation, and blending ritual, language and more often than not, were seen as the real deal by my couples. For them, it was their true “wedding day”.
It did mean though that they had to handle the organisation and costs of the legal registration separately in order to obtain the Marriage Certificate and the full protection of the law. No different really than registering the birth of a child, the date of registration was not necessarily the most important in terms of how they felt, and how they wanted to mark the occasion.
If this reform goes through, the UK finally catches up to what I saw was possible all those years ago at that vineyard in Australia. One ceremony, personal, meaningful, and with the full protection of the Marriage law.
A few other things worth knowing
It also means more responsibility sits with whoever is marrying you, since there would no longer be standard wording acting as a safety net. Choose your officiant carefully either way, but this makes it matter more, not less.
Verification, the paperwork stage that proves you are both who you say you are and free to marry, would become your officiant’s job to guide you through, rather than something your venue quietly handles in the background. Straightforward if you know it is coming.
Interfaith couples would be able to combine both traditions into a single legally recognised ceremony, rather than needing to satisfy two separate systems to keep everyone’s families happy.
Nothing, yet. This is a consultation, not a law, and most estimates point toward any of this actually taking effect around 2029. If you are planning a wedding for next year, or the year after, plan it exactly as you would today.
But if any part of this stirred something in you, the good news is you do not have to just read about it and move on. The consultation is genuinely open to couples, not only to people like me who work in the industry, and it closes 24 September 2026.
You can find it by searching Tying the knot, reforming weddings law in England and Wales, or through the link below.
I will keep you posted as this develops. Something tells me this will not be the last you hear from me about it.
