CHILD SUPPORT and other family-related issues are expected to take the spotlight when the House of Assembly meets today at 10 a.m.
Attorney General Adriel Brathwaite is down to pilot a string of amendments to both the Maintenance Act and the Family Law Act.
However, there is not yet a supplementary resolution on the Order Paper for the estimated $100 000 which Brathwaite promised late last month to seek from the House to ease the plight of mothers who frequently leave the courts empty-handed after being told there was no maintenance money for their offspring.
In the 2012 Budget, Government had pledged a minimum of $50 weekly from a $400 000 temporary Maintenance Fund for children whose payments had been delayed.
The 1981 Maintenance Act, described by one local children’s rights expert as “flawed” and “discriminatory” because it restricts applications for child maintenance to a “single woman”, while there are several single men who looked after their children, will be amended to remove that offending clause.
The bill will make provision for any parent or guardian who has primary guardianship and custody of a child to make an application for the maintenance of that child from the parent of the child who does not have primary guardianship and custody.
It also doubles the penalty for breaching any orders under the legislation from the $5000 fine of 1981 to $10 000.
Amendments to the Family Law Act, on the recommendation of the Family Law Council, will see the removal of provisions for the widening of the scope of law in respect of the alteration of property interests on divorce or separation; and the assigning of marriage counsellors by the courts.
Also on the Order Paper, but unlikely to be debated today, is a supplementary resolution for $3.5 million to provide for terminal payments to retrenched public sector officers. (AB)