Yes. There are two types of maintenance relevant to divorce proceedings. The first is child maintenance – this is maintenance that is paid to a parent with care of the children from the other parent. It is intended to support the children’s expenses. Child Maintenance is dealt with by the Child Maintenance Service and is dealt with separately (ie there is an obligation to pay it independent of any divorce proceedings).
For divorcing couples, there is also the ability for a person to claim spousal maintenance for themselves (ie maintenance from a former spouse to help meet living costs and their other outgoings (independent of any Child Maintenance).
Spousal maintenance is maintenance for the individual person. However, there isn’t an automatic entitlement to spousal maintenance. The court will normally determine whether it should be payable on the basis of whether it is ‘needed’.
There is a test that must be satisfied for spousal maintenance to be deemed appropriate. Firstly, whether or not there is a shortfall between an individual’s income and their outgoings, and secondly whether or not the other person can actually afford to pay it.
The amount of maintenance and the length of time for which it should be paid is dependent on each case and varies entirely based on the person’s individual circumstances.
For example, the court would ask the following questions:
- What do they actually need? What are their outgoings reasonably assessed?
- Are there young children that require caring for which is going to impact on an ability to work in the short or medium term?
- Does the person in need of the maintenance have an earning capacity – when can they realistically get back on their feet and become financially independent from the other person?
- How old is the person in question – for example, is the person young, with a career ahead of them or are they approaching retirement and future income opportunities limited?
All of these factors show how spousal maintenance can vary on a case-by-case basis. The court however has an obligation to effect a “clean break” at the earliest possibility (ie for the parties to be financially independent of the other at the earliest opportunity).
So in summary, yes a person can claim maintenance for themselves, but it is very much case specific, it has to be evidenced and required on the basis of “need”.
