1,516 divorces in first four years

A total of 1,516 divorces were obtained from Malta between the introduction of divorce in 2011 and the end of 2015, according to a report by the National Statistics Office (NSO).

The law came into effect on 1 October 2011, following which 42 divorces were obtained between that date and the end of the year. In 2012, the first year following the legalisation, 441 divorces were obtained, the highest number of divorces per annum recorded in the past four years.

338, 323 and 372 divorces were obtained in 2013, 2014 and 2015 respectively. The number of divorces obtained from abroad has also increased almost twofold since the law came into effect.

The report, titled ‘Trends in Malta 2016’, reports the collected information on the number of marriages, separations, annulments and divorces recognised by the Maltese authorities in the past 10 years.

Predictably, the number of annulments has seen a noticeable decrease when comparing figures from years prior to, and following, the legalisation of divorce in Malta. Whilst 200, 167, 188, 166, 124 annulments were obtained in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010 respectively, 178, 133, 90, 77 and 91 were obtained respectively between the years 2011 and 2015, keeping in mind that the law came into effect towards the end of 2011.

Similarly, the number of separations over the past four years also shows an evident overall increase, acknowledging that divorce in Malta is only obtainable after the couple has been separated for at least five years.

Whilst the number of divorces has seen a slight increase over the past three years, it is also interesting to observe the boost in popularity of civil marriages. According to the report, civil marriages ‘were almost at par with religious marriages in 2015’, whilst ‘a decade earlier, the number of civil marriages equated to half the number of religious marriages’.