Under The Marriage and Civil Partnership (Northern Ireland) (No. 2) Regulations 2020, same-sex couples can for the first time convert their civil partnerships into marriages while opposite-sex couples can convert their marriages into civil partnerships.

The changes follow the earlier legalisation of same-sex civil marriages in January and same-sex religious marriages in July.

Finance Minister Conor Murphy said: “Today is an important milestone in the campaign for marriage equality. There are over 1,300 same sex civil partnerships here. 17 couples are expected to convert their civil partnerships to marriages today with a total of 32 planned for this week.

“As a gesture of support I have waived the conversion fee for those couples and for all couples who wish to convert their civil partnership to a marriage for a full year.”

He added: “I would like to congratulate those couples who are converting their partnerships today and wish them a very happy life together.”