Lord Wallace of Tankerness: Given how specific the question is, I hope that there will be an answer for my noble friend before I sit down. I am sure those listening will have understood how specific the question is.
The point that I was going on to make is that the amendment simply appears to extend the review. However, our concern is that the extension proposed would undermine a core principle of civil partnerships. As the noble Lord, Lord Alli, said, this is about civil partnerships as they are currently understood, have developed and have been used in the years since they were established. It is important that we are talking about the nature and relationship of civil partnerships as understood, because this is a very different type of relationship.
The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, and the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, were quite candid. The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, quite properly said there would be no compulsion. Of course there would be no compulsion. She went on to say that couples would sit down and work it out. The noble Lord, Lord Anderson, said that they would take professional advice on whether the tax or social security arrangements were in their interests. We are talking about marriages which, in a religious context, would involve the engagement of a priest. I now hear that people wanting to take them on would probably have to engage the services of an accountant. These are very materially different kinds of arrangements. One is meant to be an expression of commitment and a desire to live together to the exclusion of others for life, and one is really tantamount to a tax arrangement. I do not think I am doing an injustice to the way it was actually phrased. That in no way diminishes the quality of care that exists. That was indeed the basis of the argument. My noble friend Lord Marks said that it could very well undermine the current civil partnerships as understood.
5.30 pm
The noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, inquired about the questions he submitted. I apologise if he has not had responses. The most recent information available from the Office for National Statistics gives the total number of civil partnerships formed in the United Kingdom to be 53,417. These partnerships were formed between the Civil Partnership Act 2004 coming into force in December 2005 and the end of 2011. It is not possible to estimate the impact of civil partnerships on tax revenues, as Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs does not require individuals to distinguish whether they are married or in a civil partnership.
I suspect that might answer the second question, which concerned the difference between same-sex marriage and civil partnerships. The noble Lord’s third question concerned how many blood relative, sibling or family partnerships exist, and what the cost would be. I think that is probably an impossible question to answer, not least because that knowledge is not collected by any government department in that way. It is also because,
for reasons which have been well rehearsed during this debate, where these kinds of relationships exist one does not know in how many cases the couple concerned would want to make the relationship into a civil partnership. I understand why the noble Lord asked the question, but I think it is almost impossible to answer in any meaningful way. I am happy to give way.