[Solved] maintenance for university student

Not heard of this before, I'll ask the CCLC if they can offer any advice.

Dear Dad 123

A schedule 1 application is an application made under the Children Act 1989 to the court in relation to child maintenance. If the court feel it is appropriate they can make a court order relating to maintenanace. Any letter recieved from a solicitor is not legally binding, a court application would have to be made in order to have something binding put in place.

We would advise you to contact either your local CAB or a family solicitor for further advice on this matter as we are not able to advise in detail on maintenance .

Yours faithfully

The Coram Children's Legal Centre

Hi Dad123,

Yes, this can be applied for under the Act however its own wording can be used to overturn any attempt at this. This is of course a highly unjust factor.

I would recommend that your friend disagree and state the following:
1) Firstly by default the Law recognises that as his daughter is over 18years of age she is no longer a Child, thus the Childrens Act is now void
2) The course which is being referred to is higher education and outside of CMEC jurisdiction case reference 1, and in addition is NHS funded and thus no cost is associated which cannot and should not reasonably be expected to be taken on by his daughter (in effect she should be capable of getting a job to do this, thousands of other students do... why is she an exception?)

As the CCLC have said a Court would need to make a decision on this if he refuses under the above point. However more seriously i would question the motives behind the scenes of this application. Something does not seem to add up.

If you have more information on his case more can be said. How long has he been separated? What is his relationship with his daughter like/ex-wife too? What amount of CSA maintenance was he paying up until what age? Does he have a family? Does his current partner work?

Its difficult to give a more conclusive breakdown however one thing i always say to people in your friends situation is that, should this come to Court he needs to be prepared to stand up to any detrimental factor. If an Order was made, much like my present stance with Financial aspects, should an Order be made for Maintenance i would actually recommend your friend call the bluff of the Courts and threaten to go unemployed. A Court will always take notice and the tone changes rather dramatically i can assure you.

Yoji,
Thank you very much for the response. Since the post was orginally written my friend wrote a letter to the solistor aksking numerous questions such as what uni is she at, what corse, whats her mum paying etc and he has not had a response.

Secondly more inoformation: My friend ( the father) has never had contact with his daughter..There was a court case when she was first born and the mother tried to make false allegations. The father did not fight the case and decided to tell his legal to agree with what she wanted..this was 21 years ago..He from that date paid csa to the mother..for the past few years this was £400 a month.

We have also questioned why they have decided to do this. I understand that a daughter who has never seen her dad would want to get all she can maybe? and maybe in influenced by her mother.
The father has 2 other children aged 17 and 22, he also has two step children 24 and 25. He lives with his wife.

I don't know if any of this information helps..but you have made a valid point about the childrens act and the girl now being over 18!

Thanks

Hi dad123,

Well lets be straight here, your friends daughter is just seeking to use him as a cash cow. It seems in my opinion too that there is the possibility that equally his daughter has been goaded into requesting/raising financial support for University with the backing of her mum.

Were any further Court cases taken forward? What were his reasons for just not continuing the fight to see his daughter?

Hmmm... I'd actually come from another point of view first. From some further reading i did a while ago an option may be to take the following steps:

1) Make contact directly with his daughter and ask to meet to have a chat
- At this chat he needs to see what it is she is requesting i.e. how much and what her opinions are as to why she feels an "entitlement" to claim from your friend (her Dad)... this is where the topic can change. Her reasons are likely to be along the lines of: you've had no input in my life and its the least you can do... that is the most prevalent reason. Your friend needs to question and make glaringly obvious the measure of support he has put in place already (maintenance), highlight the unfairness of expecting him to make these payments and also gently bring up the history of his no-show through her life

2) It would actually be up to him to consider a partial help for his daughter to request fee's. For example if she asked or requests £50 per month then it may not be a problem and he may be willing to make the contribution. If however he is staunchly opposed to any form of maintenance then refer back to point 1)

In the event that this does reach Court for maintenance, your friend needs to request that this be looked at objectively in that i) contact was never an option due to his ex's allegations ii) he has made the required payments totalling £X,XXX's per year for 21 years and that the Court must consider the true reasoning behind the Maintenance request under the provision that his daughter is holding him to account entirely and it undoubtedly stems from animosity as a result of years of no contact supported by his daughters mother.

Again its hard to recommend anything but one thing is for certain, your friend should not allow himself to be taken for a ride here. Solicitors may be all well and good, but very often they skirt and shunt the problem further down. Like i say i'd recommend 1) either by contacting by phone or personal letter to meet for a coffee...