New evidence shows significant shifts in our closest relationships over recent decades – with many more, across all generations, living the single life – but public policy has failed to keep up, argues the leading think tank on an ageing society.

The International Longevity Centre’s (ILC) latest briefing, ‘To have and to hold?’ evidences how our family structures are changing as attitudes and aspirations change and as we live longer lives:

• Longevity means that four or even five-generation families will become increasingly commonplace and household incomes are likely to be further stretched. The ILC’s latest analysis shows that between 2001 and 2021, the number of adult children living at home rose by 29%
• There are more blended families following divorce or separation. The latest ILC analysis shows between 2001 and 2021, the proportion of married people under 50 fell by 22% and the proportion of people over 50 who were divorced or separated increased by 54%
• ONS data suggests that the average age of parents has been steadily increasing, standing at 30.7 years for mothers and 33.7 years for fathers in 2020 (compared to 26.4 and 29.5 years in 1975).
• More people are ageing without children – with the number of people aged over 65 without adult children set to rise from 1.2 million to 2 million by 2030.
• There are more people living in open LGBTQ+ relationships, forming family structures around them. In England, almost six times more same-sex couples were living together in 2021 than in 2001.

The new briefing highlights the central importance of love and relationships to our wellbeing, and argues that as we live longer lives, we’ll need different relationships to sustain us at different stages. ILC argues that the previous life model of “born, learn, work, marry, raise children, retire and die” is increasingly at odds with our modern realities and that public policy needs to catch up.

It highlights a range of areas of mismatch between public policy and societal norms, including:

• A care system that assumes that people will be able to access care from spouses or adult children, despite more people living alone and/or ageing without children
• A pension system that penalises those who divorce
• A lack of legal clarity for those who form lasting relationships outside the traditional family/partnership norms.
• A lack of access to relationship support, particularly for those on lower incomes.

David Sinclair, Chief Executive at the International Longevity Centre UK, said:

“Even though there now is far less social pressure on people to get married or to stay in relationships that no longer work for us these shifts in attitudes are not reflected by our legal, tax or pensions systems.

While more of us may be living the single life, this doesn’t change our need for love and connection, but far too often those who don’t conform to the “mum, dad and 2.4 children” mould are left out in the cold by public policy.

“For example, far fewer of us have children, but our care system is set up to fail those who don’t have family support. This is totally unsustainable.  And the pensions system penalises those who divorce.

Although we are more open-minded and tolerant of different relationships, ageist attitudes can still get in the way – ignoring older LGBTQ+ people and stigmatising sex among older adults. We know, for example, that we’re failing to provide decent sexual health support for older women and gay men.

“We need public policy and public services that reflect our modern realities – whether that’s sexual health services right through the life course, recognition for the full range of relationships that we’ll move into and out of through our lives, or good access to relationships support when things go wrong.”

Ends

Media contacts

ILC – Press@ilcuk.org.uk or +44 (0) 7736 124 096. Spokespeople are available on request.

Notes

The ILC, the UK’s leading authority on demographic change, has embarked on a programme of work to develop a new Longevity White Paper, identifying the changes we need to make to grasp the opportunities of population ageing, and longer lives. The development of our Longevity White Paper will identify new evidence-based solutions for an ageing society.

This is the ninth in a series of thematic briefing papers setting out the issues of concern, sharing compelling new statistics, and inviting solutions. https://ilcuk.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/ILC-Longevity-Paper-Relationships.pdf

You can send any comments or ideas for solutions to info@ilcuk.org.uk

Sources

Office for National Statistics, Census 2021 and Census 2001, Accessed through Nomis 2001 Census data – Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk) and 2021 Census – Census of Population – Data Sources – home – Nomis – Official Census and Labour Market Statistics (nomisweb.co.uk)

Same-sex couples:

Source: Census 2021 (TS010) and Census 2001 (UV093). Data for England only.

Note: Numbers from 2021 Census are based on living arrangements, so won’t include people who are married or in a same sex civil partnership but who are not living together. Census 2021 data on legal partnership status suggests the total number of people in a same-sex marriage or civil partnership in England was 191,010 in 2021 (Table TS002).

Households with non-dependent children:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths/bulletins/birthcharacteristicsinenglandandwales/2020

STIs in older people (ageuk.org.uk)