Civil way: 17 August 2018

Child support maintenance will be reduced if the payer (to hell with the statutory jargon) has one or more of the children with them for at least 52 nights a year (for example, by one-seventh for 52 to 103 nights in the year). Cynics would have you believe that the reduction scheme within sch 1 to the Child Support Act 1991 and regs 46 and 47 of the Child Support Maintenance Calculations Regulations 2012 (SI 2012/2677) is occasionally the driving force behind the payer’s court application for increased contact.

In JS v SSWP and another [2018] UKUT 181 (AAC) the Upper Tribunal drew attention to the fact that the current calculations regulations differ from their predecessors in that the maintenance assessment is to look forward for 12 months from the effective date. What has to be determined is the number of nights the payer is expected to have care during the 12 month period. The regulations provide that in making the determination