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One Parent Family Payment Case 10

Question At Issue:

Claim to One Parent Family Payment refused as means derived from maintenance exceed the statutory limit.

Background:

Appellant made an application for One Parent Family Payment. She has five children and she had been separated for over two years. She was interviewed by a Social Welfare Inspector and she informed him that she was seeking legal aid to obtain a separation agreement and that her ex-spouse paid all the bills by direct debit but that it was difficult to quantify exactly how much maintenance she was getting from him.

She subsequently provided a list showing her outgoings and on the basis of this the Social Welfare Inspector quantified maintenance at around €1,200 per week. The Deciding Officer requested a letter from her solicitor confirming the current position regarding efforts to secure maintenance from her ex-spouse. She forwarded a letter stating that she had an appointment for mediation. Her claim was disallowed on the grounds that her means, derived from maintenance, exceeded the statutory limit. Maintenance was assessed at €1,226.53 per week giving weekly means of €565.65.

She appealed the decision stating that the means were overstated based on the details she had provided. She said the list she originally provided showed what income she needed, not what she was getting from her ex-spouse. She forwarded a revised list specifying the amounts paid towards bills by her ex-spouse.

The Deciding Officer stated that, having regard to the maximum disregard of €95.23 for housing, the revised weekly means based on the information supplied would be €320.58 per week which he pointed out was still in excess of the statutory limit of €245.30 weekly. He did not see the need to issue a revised decision in the circumstances.

Oral Hearing:

The appellant attended the hearing unaccompanied. The question at issue was explained.

She stated that she had not yet obtained a separation agreement. She only obtained free legal aid the week prior to the appeal hearing and she said there was a long waiting list. She said she was seeking two orders from the court (1) seeking maintenance and (2) seeking full custody of her five children. She said her ex-spouse comes and goes as he pleases at present to see the children. She said she would be due a divorce in January 2007 as she will be four years separated at that time. She said that her circumstances changed since her appeal in that her spouse was no longer making any payments since about November 2005.

The Appeals Officer addressed the position regarding the bills listed as being paid by her ex-spouse. As regards the mortgage she said the house was still in both their names. She said the car for which the loan was payable had been used by her husband before they separated. He was involved in the taxi business. She said that the engine went in the car in June 2005 and that it is in her ex-spouse’s friend’s garage since then. She said the Credit Union loan was in both their names. The total amount owed to the Credit Union when appellant made her claim was €26,939. The outstanding balance in November was €22,851.73. The shares in the Credit Union at that time amounted to €2,969.17.

She said she and her ex-spouse went to six sessions of mediation but that he pulled out of mediation after that. She said that at mediation he was trying to talk her into agreeing to get €50,000 from the bank, using the house as security, to pay the bills. She said to do this he wanted her to pretend that they were still married and living together. She did not agree to this arrangement as she did not want to put the house at risk.

She stated that all direct debits stopped being paid in November 2005 and letters started to arrive from the various institutions to which money was owed; she produced a letter from the bank regarding non payment of the car loan. She had a letter from the Credit Union about the ceasing of payments on a loan. She said that the mortgage had not been paid since November 2005; she said no money had gone into the account since November. She stated that the bank would not take her name off the account because it was always in the red.

She gave details of outstanding household bills; her phone and satellite TV had been cut off, her ESB was in arrears, she was in arrears with her home heating oil bills. She said that the life insurance policy on both their lives was stopped as the premiums were not paid. She received €560 from her ex-spouse in December 2005. She is of the view that her ex-spouse wants to let the bills build up so that the house would have to be sold and that the bills would be paid from the proceeds of the sale of the house.

She said that she had not got any money from her ex-spouse to pay for food or the day to day expenses. At present she was getting €249.00 Supplementary Welfare Allowance weekly. Prior to getting Supplementary Welfare Allowance she borrowed from friends and she has been unable to repay the loans. She said that she owes about €6,000. She referred to the cost of clothing and footwear and school expenses for her children. She also stated that she did not have the money to provide the things needed for one of her children’s upcoming Confirmation. She said she uses her Child Benefit to buy food. She produced a multitude of documents to support her evidence regarding outstanding bills etc. She agreed to supply copies of relevant documentation subsequent to the hearing.

Consideration of the Appeals Officer:

Appellant appears to have been in difficult financial circumstances for some time and her position has worsened since November 2005 when various repayments ceased to be made by her ex-spouse. After the hearing she furnished, as requested, copies of documents she produced at the appeal hearing.

While it would appear that the appellant was getting a substantial amount of maintenance from her ex-spouse, the reality is that she is barely making ends meet. An analysis of the direct debit payments made by her ex-spouse indicates that he was not making those payments exclusively for the benefit of the appellant. He still has shared ownership of the house and the loans payable are in both their names. The car loan was obtained when they were married and the car was used mainly by him for his taxi business. It has not been in use since June 2005. In the case of the Credit Union loan, appellant’s ex-spouse would appear to have obtained loans for his own use and that the repayments are partly in respect of those loans.

The reality is that the appellant is not receiving any maintenance for day to day expenses for food, clothes, etc. Instead she had been getting some benefit from payments made by her ex-spouse but at the same time he had a self-interest in continuing to make at least some of those payments. Appellant has initiated proceedings to obtain maintenance after attempts at mediation failed. This should result in her financial affairs being legally sorted out in due course. Having regard to the circumstances of the case, and in particular to the fact that appellant was not getting any direct financial maintenance from her ex-spouse which could have been put to use as she chose (e.g. to purchase essentials like food, clothes etc.) the Appeals Officer felt that it would be inappropriate to assess as maintenance all the payments her ex-spouse had been making. Essentially, as payments made by her ex-spouse were made indirectly, she had no control over the spending of what was being classed as maintenance.

It is the Appeals Officer’s view that the only payments that should be assessed are electricity (€25.00), heating fuel (€37.00), telephone (€30.00) and half the life insurance policy (€25.00). This gives weekly means of €58.50. The evidence shows that maintenance payments ceased since November 2005, so means should be “Nil” from then.

Outcome:

Appeal allowed.

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