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The following information is of a general nature. Please contact our firm to
arrange for a consultation.
The separation of a married couple or a common law couple requires the
consideration and settlement of three general areas:
Children's Issues
There are two primary legal issues relating to children, namely:
1. Custody
2. Child support
Custody
Custody can be either sole, joint, or shared. The law provides that the best interests of children are always to be taken into account in determining custody. There are many factors involved in determining custody including the following:
(a) History - What is the history of each parent’s involvement in raising the children. A parent who has been primarily involved in raising the children will likely continue to have primary care and control of the children after separation.
(b) Are the parties prepared to cooperate and work together?
(c) Is one parent attempting to deny contact between the other parent and the children? In such a case, the parent who does not facilitate contact may lose custody to the parent who is more cooperative.
Mediation is often employed to facilitate a custody agreement.
Child Support
Child support under both the Divorce Act and The Family Maintenance Act is determined by the Child Support Guidelines. The Guidelines set the basic amount of support based on the gross income of the parent who is required to pay support.
There can also be additional child support for extraordinary costs, examples include: daycare, medical costs including orthodontic costs and tuition for post secondary education. The parties will be required to share the net cost based on their proportional share of the combined income of the parties. For example, if the gross income of the parties are equal, they will each pay fifty percent of the net cost, if one parent has 75% of the combined gross income of the parties he would pay 75% of the net cost of the extraordinary cost.
Child support generally continues to age 18. After age 18 child support continues to be payable if the child attends an educational institution on a full time basis. Many factors need to be reviewed in cases involving adult children to determine if child support should continue or terminate.
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