A wealthy man recently saw the amount payable under a maintenance agreement, which provided for his child, increased by the court and subsequently scaled back by the Court of Appeal. The man had never married the mother of the child, nor had he lived with her. He had, however, agreed to provide for the child's maintenance. The woman also had a second child who had a different father.
Following an application by the child's mother, the father was ordered by the court to make substantially increased periodical payments for the child's maintenance. He was also ordered to provide a housing trust fund for the child and to pay £100,000 as a lump sum to clear the mother's debts, which she had incurred as a result of moving to a larger house in order to have more room for her family.
The father appealed against this order, arguing that there was no basis for replacing the earlier agreement, which was intended to be a final agreement and was negotiated with the benefit of specialist legal advice on both sides. He maintained that the practical effect of the order would be to benefit the second child, for whom he bore no responsibility. The order would therefore act to relieve that child's father of his obligations.
The Court of Appeal ruled that the level of maintenance should be increased but agreed that the mother's debts arose as a result of the move to a bigger home. As such, part of the debt was clearly due to the needs of the second child, not the man's own child. Accordingly, the lump sum he was ordered to pay towards the mother's debts was reduced to £50,000.
Says Jane Flemming, "The courts are required to consider the needs of the child in such cases and the responsibility for maintenance rests with the parents of that child. In this case, the financial responsibility for the maintence of the second child lay elsewhere."
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