It would have been better for the referendum to be held after the national census as the results would have given a picture of the reality experienced b y families today, David Zahra from the anti-divorce group said this afternoon.

Mr Zahra was speaking during a debate on campus between the anti-divorce and divorce movements, organised by the students' organisation Move.

Mr Zahra said that with the introduction of divorce children would be brought up with a mentality that they could just walk out on problems.

He said that the country was rushing into taking its decision.

But Deborah Schembri, from the yes camp, pointed out it was the Prime Minister and not the yes camp, who had announced the referendum.

She said that any assessments about the impact of divorce on society would have been a projection.

Any study, she said, would have shown an increase in marriage breakdown which was taking place anyway with separation, so the link with divorce would be flawed.

She pointed out that there was a lower rate of marriage breakdown in Italy, where divorce was available.

And in many countries where there is divorce, many marriages still lasted forever.

Asked if divorce would have an impact on taxes, Dr Schembri said the Finance Minister, would certainly have released a report had this been the case.

Former minister Michael Falzon, also from the yes camp, said that no one divorced frivolously just as no one went into marriage lightly.

The argument of the no group, he said, was disrespectful to men, making it seem like they would leave a marriage as soon as divorce was introduced for a size 10 woman just like cats of heat.

Austin Bencini, from the anti-divorce movement, said that Malta was not socially ready for the introduction of divorce to have a positive effect.

The current legislation gave no other reason than the passage of four years for people to divorce. This would an imposition of divorce on a partner who wanted to fight for marriage.

The introduction of divorce, Dr Bencini said, would remove the bargaining power of those who wanted to fight for marriage.

The No camp also raised the issue of maintenance saying that in practice it was already difficult to guarantee this was paid when there was only one marriage, let alone if there were more marriages in the picture.

Student Kevin Mercieca asked how a country with a relative poverty rate of 15 per cent was going to cope with having to maintain former partners and children from previous marriages.

Dr Schembri said that, at the moment, the woman in a second partnership was legally unprotected and exposed to poverty even more.