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| Why is UNITY required? Broken families produce a broken society, and family life is threatened as never before in Britain. More than 40% of marriages end in divorce, with over 150,000 in England and Wales in 2004. The majority of these couples had at least one child aged under 16. More than a quarter of children currently live in one-parent households while, in 2006, figures show 250,000 more one-parent families than in 1997. Research published by the think tank, The Centre for Social Justice, has found that those experiencing family breakdown are 75% more likely to fail at school, 70% more likely to become drug addicts, 50% more likely to have alcohol problems, 40% more likely to get into serious debt and 35% more likely to be unemployed. Furthermore, a recent and well-received UK policy review on family breakdown, found that nearly one in two couples who live together split up before their child’s fifth birthday. This compares to one in twelve married parents. Finally, in 2006, an analysis of the latest data from the Millennium Cohort Study found that risk of family breakdown was 6% for married couples and 32% among unmarried couples. It also found that family breakdown resulted in higher levels of crime, anti-social behaviour, educational failure, and mental and emotional disturbance. For British Muslims, the problems are more complex. With the added factors of religious law, arranged marriages and other cultural and religious considerations, it is increasingly hard for Muslims to keep their families intact. Issues faced by Muslims include teenage children being caught between the Muslim culture and the expectations of society, and the increased education of both Muslim women and men has lead to them expect a more just marriage based on liberating Islamic principles rather than culture. Intercultural marriages, too, present their own challenges. Such problems require specialist help from trained consultants well versed with the problems faced by Muslim communities. Fortunately, UNITY provides such a service. At present, we focus on pre-marital, marital and post-marital guidance and support. |
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