Rights and duties

Britain took most of the twentieth century to reach full democracy at the ballot box. The property and sex restrictions that had once limited who could vote were removed in stages, and by 1928 the country had a fully democratic voting system, with everyone able to take part on equal terms.

Other protections followed later. In 2007 Parliament passed the Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act, which created a new kind of court order to protect people from being forced into marriage. That order, the Forced Marriage Protection Order, started operating in 2008; a person at risk, or someone acting for them, can apply for one, and breaching it is a contempt of court. Scotland introduced its own equivalent order in 2011, extending the same kind of protection there too. A separate piece of legislation, the Equality Act, followed in 2010.