Law Reform
(Miscellaneous Provisions) (Jersey) Law 2003
Official
Consolidated Version
This is an official
version of consolidated legislation compiled and issued under the authority of
the Legislation (Jersey) Law 2021.
12.350
Showing the law
from 1 January 2019 to Current
Law Reform
(Miscellaneous Provisions) (Jersey) Law 2003
A LAW to abolish the customary law
right to bring an action for breach of promise of marriage, subject to a saving
for such actions in respect of void marriages; to make provision, upon an
agreement to marry being ended, for the return of gifts made by one of them to
the other; and for connected purposes
Commencement
[see
endnotes]
1 Interpretation
In this Law, “commencement date” means the date this Law
comes into force.
2 Agreement
to marry unenforceable
(1) An agreement between 2
persons to marry one another shall not have effect as a contract giving rise to
legal rights.
(2) No cause of action
shall lie for breach of such an agreement, whatever the law applicable to it.
(3) This Article –
(a) shall
not affect any action commenced before the commencement date; but
(b) shall
otherwise have effect in relation to agreements entered into before the
commencement date.
3 Return
of gifts
(1) A party to an agreement
to marry (the “giver”) who makes a gift of property to the other
party to the agreement on the express or implied condition that it shall be
returned if the agreement is ended shall not be prevented from recovering the
property by reason only that the giver ends the agreement.
(2) The gift of an
engagement ring shall be presumed to be an absolute gift.
(3) The presumption in paragraph (2)
may be rebutted by proving that the ring was given on the express or implied
condition that it should be returned if, for any reason, the marriage does not
take place.
4 Damages
for surviving party to void marriage
(1) Where a person dies
after the commencement date (the “deceased”) and is survived by
someone (the “survivor”) who, whether before or after the
commencement date had, in good faith, entered into a void marriage with the
deceased, then, notwithstanding Article 2, a cause of action shall
continue to accrue to the survivor in damages against the estate of the
deceased.
(2) A cause of action shall
not so accrue if the marriage of the deceased and the survivor was dissolved or
annulled during the deceased’s lifetime and the dissolution or annulment
is recognized by the law of Jersey or if the survivor has, during the lifetime
of the deceased, entered into a later marriage.
5 Citation
This Law may be cited as Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions)
(Jersey) Law 2003.