# Father's obligations



## Bongo (31 Jul 2006)

A freind of mine has managed to become a "father to be" by accident.  The woman & himself do not plan on staying together, so she will be a lone parent.  What financial obligations does he have to the mother/child?

Tks


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## nelly (31 Jul 2006)

you play you play, 
his child, he has to cough up to maintain his child's living until the can do it for themselves. As to what extent? i do not know - he should get a solicitor.


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## ClubMan (31 Jul 2006)

Check out _OASIS _- e.g.


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## purplealien (31 Jul 2006)

We pay 70 euro a week - it depends on your circumstances.


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## lff12 (1 Aug 2006)

Technically you are liable to pay maintenance if you acknowledge paternity or are forced by a court to undergo a paternity test, but there is no formal process in Ireland outside of going through the courts the long and hard way, which for most lone parents is just too costly.

Attempts to force absent fathers to fork out in the UK through the Child Support Agency have now been accepted as a total failure so its unlikely (though not improbable) that Ireland would try to fund its every spiralling cost of supporting single parent families in this way.  The irony of the entire support system for lone (usually female) parents is that it has to a large extent transferred fiscal responsiblity from the absent parent to society at large.  What this means is that everybody pays for it through their taxes - including absent parents.  Until the day when somebody accepts the idea of directly taxing absent parents, the status quo will remain.  To be honest, it is the next best solution to a direct tax on absent fathers (which would be beset by constant legal challenges).


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## purplealien (1 Aug 2006)

> there is no formal process in Ireland outside of going through the courts the long and hard way, which for most lone parents is just too costly.


Single mothers get free legal aid so there is nothing costly about it for them.


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## jammacjam (1 Aug 2006)

purplealien said:
			
		

> Single mothers get free legal aid so there is nothing costly about it for them.


 If they qualify just like everyone else


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## RainyDay (1 Aug 2006)

purplealien said:
			
		

> Single mothers get free legal aid so there is nothing costly about it for them.


Are you sure? I don't see anything about special treatment for single mothers on the [broken link removed]?



			
				lff12 said:
			
		

> Until the day when somebody accepts the idea of directly taxing absent parents, the status quo will remain.  To be honest, it is the next best solution to a direct tax on absent fathers (which would be beset by constant legal challenges).


Isn't this pretty-much the system that failed miserably in the UK?


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## purplealien (1 Aug 2006)

> Are you sure? I don't see anything about special treatment for single mothers on the [broken link removed]?


I know my friend did anyway. I'll be seeing her today - i'll ask her about it.


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## CCOVICH (1 Aug 2006)

Keep it on topic-this thread is about a father's obligations, not single mothers.


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## D8Lady (1 Aug 2006)

He can be brought through the family court process. It is not as formal as regular court. It can be the judge, both parties & court oficial. No solicitors necessary if you can sort it out amicably. 

The judge will make an order on weekly/monthly payment. Your  friend has 2 choices. Pay as ordered by court. Or don't pay, be brought back to court and have his earning endorsed at source. This means that his employer will become directly involved. 

If your friend does make any payments, do so by electronic funds transfer so that he has a record of any payments. Don't give cash without a receipt.


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## KatieC (3 Aug 2006)

If this was a very temporary relationship, perhaps a paternity test may be a good investment for the guy.


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## Ger (3 Aug 2006)

The going rate for maintenance is 75 euro per week in my area. I think you can offset this against tax.The judge will presume your the father unless you can prove differently.(blood test).I have had 3 personal visits to the family district court myself on a different matter & I can advise you to keep well clear if possible. In one instance I had to wait 8 hours before my case was heard. The waiting rooms was packed & there was not even enough seats.


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## Fly (9 Aug 2006)

The fathers' obligations go beyond the financial even if the child was unintentional, (as I'm guessing, a lot of us were, in or outside of marriage).   So they are both faced with this child they didn't plan. Why wouldn't co-parenting work? This wouldn't be the first child born to two people who don't plan on having a long term relationship with each other.  From now on it's about the child and it shouldn't be beyond the wit of them to work out some sort of plan whereby the child spends good time with both even if they don't have any feelings for each other.
Good luck to the three of them.  I hope your friend can see that this could be the start of a fantastic new life as a Dad.  Most adults enjoy it ...why wouldn't he?  Yes, children can be expensive so I suppose he should start saving now for all the things they need in the first year and then maybe work out between them how they fund things going forward.


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## porterbray (9 Aug 2006)

Maintenance for a spouse is tax deductable, and only if enforced by a court order. But maintenance for a child is not deductable under the premise that it is the obligation of the parents to provide for the upbringing of their children.


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## Jamjam (9 Aug 2006)

bocade said:
			
		

> Is it just me or is this depressing. What price a child, not to mention the implied single parent families? Hey, at least its tax deductable.


 
Yes this is depressing. I think that if this is his child he should want to support him/her in any way he can. (I am not suggesting he doesn't btw) Who can say/not say that there is a going rate to support a child. Looks like the mom will be coughing up the most of it then if it's only 75 squid a week!

.Holy hell.....when did dialogue lose its importance? Can they not come to some arrangement about it?


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## Bill (4 Sep 2006)

75euro may be the obligation but very stingy. A parent should want the best for his child and obviously 75/week is not sufficient to support a child (nor is twice that!)


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## December (5 Sep 2006)

Generally, his obligations as a father are to help in whatever way he can to make sure to work with the mother and try to bring the child up as loved, healthy, well educated, well mannered, and as emotionally secure and confident as possible.

Is he only thinking about money? (tut tut)

He should also consider becoming legal guardian to the child.  Have a look at this  [broken link removed]

to find out how, as an unmarried father has very little rights in Ireland.


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## purplealien (5 Sep 2006)

Bill said:


> 75euro may be the obligation but very stingy. A parent should want the best for his child and obviously 75/week is not sufficient to support a child (nor is twice that!)


Very stingy? - maybe if that person has is single and got a good job. Not for people who have a wife and kids to support aswell. There's all different circumstances. Father's should be allowed pay what they can ( and i mean genuinely pay what they can)- money should not be the issue - a stable and loving relationship should be.
Fathers have no rights - it's ridicolous!


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## ClubMan (6 Sep 2006)

Can people please take rants to _Letting Off Steam _and stick to discussing the substantive issues here?


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## jrewing (6 Sep 2006)

Oh god.....fathers' rights! Who let John Waters in ?


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## lff12 (23 Sep 2006)

purplealien said:


> Very stingy? - maybe if that person has is single and got a good job. Not for people who have a wife and kids to support aswell. There's all different circumstances. Father's should be allowed pay what they can ( and i mean genuinely pay what they can)- money should not be the issue - a stable and loving relationship should be.
> Fathers have no rights - it's ridicolous!


 
Fair comment. Effectively its a vicious circle - unmarried fathers are technically expected to pay for their children, but have no rights regardless of whether they pay up or not. From what I can see over the last 20 years, a very large percentage don't care anyway as they don't want the responsibilities anyway. I know a girl and her 1 year old child who was recently abandoned by her boyfriend who was contributing not a single penny despite having a decent job because he decided she was "too fat." (She's about a size 10 by the way). Scumbags like him should be held account for their responsiblities, and the best way is to hit them where it hurts, right in their wallets.

Having said that, it is very difficult to get unmarried (and sometimes even married) fathers to pay up because this being litigous Ireland, they can and will in many cases challenge everything.

The reason the UK system failed is not because they were implementing what I suggested, but because it became so bogged down in the complexities of every case.  This is why i suggest that the absent parent be taxed at a flat rate on all income including social welfare.  (And we do forget that about 10% of absent parents are women!)  The uk system tried to assess people on their individual means and also had to deal with people moving around.  But if you are claiming or down as liable for a permanent kind of tax benefit such as rent relief for example, you automatically keep getting it until otherwise suggested.  If my suggested absent parent tax were implemented in the same way, then it would simply get automatically deducted at source.

Then we could start talking about more rights for the absent parent - its quite hard to assign rights to people who don't take up their responsibilities and leave them to the rest of society.

I will say one thing and that the child has rights.  One of them is the right to know who Dad is, and this is something to think about in years to come.


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## Gordanus (23 Sep 2006)

Does this guy intend to become a parent to this child, having now fathered him/her?   Could he not get together with the mother to discuss issues of sharing custody, maintenence etc?  If he takes the child for a few days a week, he will also be able to claim single parents allowance (don't know what it is called) against tax.   It will increase the amount he earns before tax is taken, ie his tax free allowance.   I would recommend going to mediation rather than solicitors as the mediator is out to reach a solution which is agreeable to both parties, rather than win the max allowance for the woman/smallest possible allowance from the father.  They have a website at www.mediation.ie.  He will after all be in touch with this woman for the next 18 years whether he likes it or not and they might as well make it amicable.


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## MamaMia (23 Sep 2006)

purplealien said:


> Very stingy? - maybe if that person has is single and got a good job. Not for people who have a wife and kids to support aswell.


 
Why should one biological child be deemed less worthy of support than another? The child isn't at fault. Actions have consequences...


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## Sophia2457 (4 Oct 2006)

Very interesting thread.
Can anyone answer this question - if the father subsequently marries someone else, but continues with maintenance, big part of child's life etc., is the mother entitled to go to court to have the new spouse's salary taken into account and the maintenance raised on this basis (not cos of inflation or anything)?
I ask because of a newly- married couple I know where the guy has a daughter from a previous short relationship. He has always supported the child and she stays with them every second weekend, goes on hols etc. Out of the blue the mother wants the new spouse's salary and property to be taken into account as she reckons the father is better off financially than he was before the marriage. The child is 13. The new spouse has just had a promotion in work, the guy's salary is the same.
Hope I'm not hijacking the thread and thanks.


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