 The Act requires that the Secretary of State report regularly to Parliament, designed to limit the ability of the sovereign to prorogue parliament, as well as providing for the legalisation of same-sex marriage and opposite-sex civil partnership in Northern Ireland (in line with the rest of the UK) and the liberalisation of abortion laws (in line with abortion rights in England and Wales) if no executive was formed by midnight on 21 October 2019.After the deadline passed, abortion was decriminalised automatically by repeal of Sections 58 and 59 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861; in December 2019 the British Government passed regulations legalising same-sex marriage and opposite-sex civil partnerships on 13 January 2020.Further regulations governing abortion came into force on 31 March 2020.