The Deluge of Marriage Celebrants
by Tony Gelme - 25 Jan 2010
The concerns of the marriage celebrant community are important. At this time marriage celebrants need effective leadership and positive action.
I appreciate and support the views and opinions of experienced celebrants. I agree that, with cheap (or in some instances zero or near to zero) fees, those celebrants are “shooting themselves in the foot”. It seems they can do this because of other income which subsidises their celebrancy services.
We can't, however, ignore the reality there are somewhere between 10,000 and possibly 20,000 (and no limit on appointments in sight) marriage celebrants available to service a tiny wedding market.
As a result, just about everybody marrying knows a celebrant – one in the family – a friend – an acquaintance – a friend of a friend. No doubt these celebrants, close to couples, offer free or discounted rates – "mates rates‟.
Additionally, we cannot ignore the very real fact there will never be sufficient weddings to justify the services of the many thousands of marriage celebrants anxious to provide services. This can only promote massive and desperate discounting. Commonsense (something in short supply in the A-G‟s Dept) tells me celebrants have a responsibility to call for a STOP to this lunacy of never ending marriage celebrant appointments (made worse by failure to adequately interview and assess applicants for suitability as celebrants). It has already gone too far with awful results including, but not limited to,
- (1) lowering of standards,
- (2) increase of errors in documentation sent to BDMs,
- (3) ongoing price wars engendering a feeling in the community that price is all that matters – not quality, experience, ability, qualifications, knowledge, etc.,
- (4) dreadful wedding ceremonies – ruining valuable lifetime memories for couples,
- (5) outrageous profiteering by unscrupulous trainers offering cheap short courses conducted by non celebrants or barely qualified celebrants, „training‟ people to be celebrants,
- (6) destruction of the previously highly regarded civil marriage celebrancy program, for which Australia had been justly proud.
It's all been said before. I've tried to say it in my previously distributed White Paper. It appears – the A-G (currently holidaying) has NOT been listening to us.
The MCS (Deborah Nance) is not listening to us. As a result the thoughtless madness continues.
Do marriage celebrants have any other plans or is it our intention to just watch as the situation goes from incredibly awful to absolutely impossible?
With all this there is a people cost:
1. Longer term good and experienced celebrants are finding it extremely difficult to practise their craft and to provide the excellent services they have in the past.
2. Thousands of newer appointed celebrants are finding it difficult to find any use for their qualification, any opportunity to improve their skills & knowledge and any opportunity to recoup their training, setup and ongoing celebrant costs.
3. Marrying couples continue to be confused by the masses of celebrants offering all sorts of prices (or none) and are finding, too late, their very special wedding has been ruined.
4. Australia’s civil marriage celebrant program is falling into disrepute. The people of Australia suffer. Any helpful comments?