Cunard Line is abandoning its British registry after 171 years in order to offer its guests the chance to get married on board its ships.

At least that's what it claims. Weddings can't be conducted on British-registered ships but loyal customers are reported to be up in arms about the announcement that the three Cunard ships - Queen Mary 2, Queen Elizabeth 2 and Queen Victoria - will switch their registration to Bermuda next spring, suspecting the real reason for the move by Cunard's American parent, Carnival Corp, is to take advantage of cheaper labour laws. Under the new Equality Act, ships registered in Britain are required to pay all staff from European Union countries wages equal to those of British citizens.

Peter Shanks, Cunard President and Managing Director, has defended the move saying that the cruise line is proud of how it looks after every member of its crew and the ships home port will still be Southampton. The reason the name 'Southampton' on the stern of their ships is being changed to 'Hamilton' he says, is solely due to the demand for weddings at sea.

"Most of our competitors have been developing increasingly popular and lucrative ‘Weddings at Sea’ programmes, and these are now very big business in the cruise industry. We receive a lot of enquiries about the possibility of being married on one of our ships – particularly about weddings in mid-Atlantic on board Queen Mary 2, which no other company can offer", he said.

Cunard’s ‘Weddings at Sea’ programme will begin after their World Voyages programmes have been completed in Spring next year and the fleet has been 're-flagged' outside the EU, though, because Bermuda is still a British territory, some pretense of 'Britishness' will survive - they can keep their red ensign flags.