Nearly 7,000 gay British couples
register for civil partnerships since law went
into effect

Almost 7,000 gay couples have registered for civil partnerships in Britain since the marriage-like unions were introduced in December. According to official figures released yesterday and today, 6,516 couples registered their partnerships in England and Wales, and nearly 350 couples have done the same in Scotland, the Associated Press reports.

About two-thirds of those couples are male, the figures from the General Register Office show, and Westminster in central London leads all registration offices with 238 partnerships so far.

Gay couples in England and Wales were allowed to register on December 21 for civil partnerships, which give the couples many of the rights that married heterosexual couples have, and in that month there were 1,901 partnerships registered. Scottish gay couples were allowed to register one day earlier, but there was no figure for how many registered in December. (The Advocate)