Danish Island Weddings believes it has helped secure a major success in its efforts to ensure that international couples can once more marry on Ærø (Denmark) just as easily as they did up until last year. At meetings on the 29th/31st May Ærø welcomed the minister responsible for the change in procedure which had seriously threatened Ærø’s position as the international wedding capital of the world. The minister, Mai Mercado, heard about the unintended but serious impact of her changes on the economy of “Wedding Island” (as the Wall Street Journal called Ærø). She then promised to roll back the legislation and return the processing of wedding applications to the local authorities - the “kommuner” - where it had been up to the end of 2018.
Denmark earned a reputation as the place to go for international couples who wanted to marry, but who found the excessively bureaucratic systems in most other countries meant they simply could not. Many of these couples – even from two different EU countries – found there was no way to meet the Kafkaesque requirements in the country where they lived, or anywhere else. So they came to Ærø – over 5300 international couples in 2018. In the Danish Island Weddings office on Ærø there is a world map with a pin in each of 176 countries – every country from which we have welcomed a bride or groom. Typically, they are from two different countries but resident in a third – for example, an Australian marrying a Brazilian but living in Dubai, or a Brit marrying an American but living in Germany.
Up until 2018 the checking, processing and approval of their paperwork was done on the island, at Ærø Kommune, by the registrars. But there was a problem, which did need addressing. Under Danish regulations the registrars could not refuse to marry any couple, even if they felt something was wrong, as long as their documentation was in order. So some of the couples who were brought to Denmark (by one German agency in particular) were not genuine, but trying to get an EU visa through marriage. The solution should have been simple – give the registrars more power. That is what the Irish did, facing a similar problem in 2014, and it worked.
Oddly, the government chose to discount the experience of the Irish, and the advice of those involved in wedding tourism, and chose instead to introduce a new system. This system involved a new online application process, new guidance, and new inexperienced staff in a new centralised unit. Predictably, the unit was completely unready and unfit for purpose on the start date, 1st January 2019, and international marriages plummeted by 85%, with literally hundreds of applications stuck or lost in the system. Given that Mai Mercado and her colleagues had specifically undertaken not to damage international wedding tourism, it was clear something had to be done. Initial steps to simply improve the system have had some positive effect, and Danish Island Weddings is now almost back to operating normally. Couples from all over the world are looking to Ærø once more, and many of them getting through the system with relatively limited fuss in days or a few weeks.
But even for Danish island Weddings the promised return of the processing to Ærø Kommune will be hugely welcome, and ensure the same level of speed and efficiency that was possible last year. Of course, a promise is one thing – action is another! We are targeting the end of the year at the latest for the promises to be kept and the policy to be reversed. And we will be following and influencing events until Ærø becomes Wedding Island again!