The rights of cohabitants

Gozo Bishop Mario Grech (The Sunday Times, May 17) is saying that cohabitation must not be given the same legal status as marriage; that legal provisions regarding it should be distinct from the laws regulating marriage; that recognising cohabitation would be unjust and discriminate against married couples and that recognition must not be granted to cohabiting partners who are not a family.

But do not a man and a woman who are legally separated and have children constitute a family? Are they not a family more than a couple who are supposed to be married (in the eyes of society) but in reality live separate lives? There are many such 'families' on our islands. The survey conducted by the NSO regarding cohabitation does not show the real picture as in fact the number of cohabitants is much higher.

Cohabitants with children pay taxes on single terms even though the woman does not work in order to take care of the children.

Is that fair? In the case of married couples where only the husband works while the woman stays at home, the income tax rate for couples, which is much more generous, applies. But the only difference is that one woman is married and the other is not even though both couples are parents who are bringing up children, which is not only a social responsibility but also a moral one. Is that not discriminating between one family and another?

We should be living in a world of equal opportunities, not discrimination. The family is a social form, while marriage is a moral form and we are living in a social world.

I am not saying that marriage is not right but give cohabitants the right to live together and raise their offspring and have the same rights as married couples, since they are indeed a family with the responsibility to raise their children properly.