Why are nursery fees not included in child maintenance?

Every situation is different, so this feed is too broad.

I got asked to leave by a selfish ex partner who in the modern feminist world thinks she wants to do it all by herself ... Accept she doesn't... She wants UC, child benefit, maintenance, 65,% of house sale.. 👍 really independent, well done 👏 ... Oh and don't worry, the father asked to leave unexpectedly that now can't afford a pot to piss in and couldn't dream of getting back on the housing ladder, should shut the fuck up and raise his maintenance because she's so fucking hard done down by. No worries, I'll have main custody and take the benefits/UC and maintenance of you, and the so called hardship you suffer.... Yea right..not a chance, because of course you want it all.

Perhaps next time you choose to get married and have a child you should consider the commitment you made and stop chasing an Instagram life that doesn't exist 👍

Cheers guys

If the costs of childcare and housing were reasonable in the country, I would absolutely say that the NRP should be paying more of their wages as child support, but it isn't. We aren't going to fix any of those issues by crippling the NRP financially, whilst it still not being enough money to help the RP get back into work/get better employment opportunities.

I would much rather pay more tax for childcare than spend much more on unemployment benefits because we don't want to sort this situation out.

Men will never see us as equal if most women are being trapped as SAHPs or on low wages to fit around school hours. The only way to stop them being the "breadwinner" is to improve opportunities for women, not make it worse for men.

The cut off for the tax relief is £100k for an individual. My partner and I earn a similar amount to you, me slightly less as I'm on 80% hours and get £500 a quarter if we put in the qualifying amount. Now my daughter has her 30 free hours our bills are now about 40% less so we don't use the full amount anymore.

We still qualify for most of the child benefit too. My partner has to do a self assessment tax return but as there are various things that come out before tax his taxable income is just over £50k rather than quite a lot over. It was an evenings work to fill the form in but we keep about 80% of the child benefit. Do claim for it and don't assume that at £58k you will lose so much it's not worthwhile claiming as it's the taxable wage that matters not the gross amount

To answer your original question. Child maintenance should cover the appropriate proportion of all reasonable costs of child care not just the bare essentials of keeping them alive. Food, clothes, child care, school trips, hair cuts all of it.

Women will always put their dc first, unlike most men, if all women tomorrow took their dc to ex’s house and said they’re your responsibility now and walked off then men would get a big wake up call.
But women would never do this because their dc come first.
Many men are shite, it’s sad how disgusting men are.

Agree 100%

Could he cover more childcare?

Do you qualify for UC or tax credits etc to help?

You’d probably find that you’d be paying less tax (or just the same) because childcare subsidies enable more women to work and to work more. So they pay more tax as a result. Long term they pay much more tax than if they’d been out of the workforce for many years.

The UK isn’t particularly family friendly so it isn’t surprising, childcare in the UK is very expensive. Where we now live fulltime childcare for our daughter is about £89 a month as she is our second child, so fees are a bit cheaper. Here when parents split a financial agreement must be made, it doesn’t depend on their marital status. If a NRP refuses to pay the government steps in and pays from about £130-190 a month depending on the age of the child, this becomes debt which is chased up. The amount is also guaranteed to cover childcare costs.

Here the childs costs make a part of maintenance, including clubs, clothing, buying presents and the RPs housing costs etc. I just used our government website and if we were to break up and weren’t 50/50 I would have to pay £578 per month or he would have to pay £654 per month for a two year old and an eight year old. When you then consider that the entire childcare costs are about £89, that does provide enough for food, clothing, heating, hobbies etc.

So here essentially RP parent A NRP parent B

child support = childs cost x (B’s surplus/ surplus for A+B)

Probably the only answer is for the mother to refuse more than 50% care of the child and leave partner to sort childcare for "their" days.

There should as a minimum be a government rate, and the nrp must pay 50% of all childcare hours (after any funded hours are taken off) used by the child at that rate. It should be in addition to other maintenance. Ideally both parents would simply be 50% liable for any childcare bill, but it gets difficult where one parent chooses the swankiest glossy nursery in town where the other parent can't afford that and would like to use a cost effective childminder.

Its one of the things I always think is absurd though, that its very easy for nrp to basically dodge childcare costs. 9% of income is nowhere near enough.

It would be much better if we did raise taxes that tiny bit so that childcare was free/very affordable.

I don’t want to pay any more tax for this.

The likelihood of that could just mean that neither parent can afford to work which means the resident parent would get even less money from the non resident parent (assuming they were already paying). Also it would be likely that the non resident parent wouldn't be able to have the children over night as they will probably be in a shared house/sofa surfing so won't have anywhere suitable to bring the children back to due to not being able to afford something better.

It would be much better if we did raise taxes that tiny bit so that childcare was free/very affordable. Doing that will help alleviate poverty as the resident parent can then work, give the children better outcomes in life and help raise tax due to the newly working parent's increased income.

You are right. It is unfair. And I agree that the Government shouldn't be paying - tax payers already pay some nursery and school fees etc. Taxes should not go up; parents should pay 50/50.

I am a bit tired of the single mothers stereotyped as benefit scroungers. Many of us are educated with strong careers, and the only way we can hold on to those careers is to pay an equivalent of another morgage on a childcare.

100% this

My twins childcare is twice my mortgage at £2k per month. I have more than one degree and a professional qualification - I earn over the child benefit threshold so don't even get that.

I work full time because I have to and to try and I still in my children ambition and work ethic - I've taken out long term loans to pay to spread child costs over 10 years. Anything and everything is possible

I am a bit tired of the single mothers stereotyped as benefit scroungers. Many of us are educated with strong careers, and the only way we can hold on to those careers is to pay an equivalent of another morgage on a childcare
I was a very educated well paid single mum and I received a bit of help with childcare, albeit not a lot. I received NO maintenance at all from their dad.

I certainly had the last laugh when my youngest was finally old enough not to require childcare though. I felt I'd earn the lottery! The difference was put into the mortgage and that was then paid off a few years later. I now can consider retiring before 60.

I did it on my own and I'm very proud of it. Their dad can live with the deep seated shame and the knowledge that his children have not much respect for his financial conduct.

It is very very common!

I am a bit tired of the single mothers stereotyped as benefit scroungers. Many of us are educated with strong careers, and the only way we can hold on to those careers is to pay an equivalent of another morgage on a childcare.

My childcare bill is £2k per month alone as I have twins and an older child.

Ex pays £300 per month total

It's not a choice whether to send them to childcare not

I can't force him to pay more

It is quite rare that a nrp doesn't get any help at all from the benefit system for childcare. Even on your income OP, you might very well be entitled. Then there's the scheme and free hours from 3 years old.

I agree, it's disgusting. My sister is going through a nasty divorce and because her ex pays child maintenance, he doesn't think he should contribute towards childcare costs. So she's been forced to pay the nursery fees so she can work, while he can work as many days as he likes every week without a second thought as to where his child is or who's looking after her. The child maintenance he pays doesn't even scratch the surface of the nursery fees. The system is completely broken. If she doesn't pay for nursery, she'd be forced to get a job working the one evening a week he has their daughter and every other Saturday when he has her. Not sure how she's supposed to live off that kind of income. I had no idea the set up was so anti women until she went through this.

Unfortunately because it’s not the single parents who make the rules.

There should be a sort of pension paid for single parents that can be used to pay for childcare as well as the other children's needs. The amount would depend on the age of the child(ren) and any special needs.

It should be paid in the same way as a student loan with the 'debt' shared between parents (with special needs paid by government) to be paid from income after your child is a certain age.

I've not fully worked this out so please comment on how this could work.

Childcare is as essential to society as education and the NHS so should be free at the point of delivery (ie paid collectively by the taxpayer).

Child maintenance is something else.

Ex is a millionaire & I've never had a penny.

Even worse the taxpayer footed a huge bill in tax credits for the full time childcare I used.

If the post office can jail subpostmasters for unpaid bills then why can't the government start jailing non paying deadbeat dads?

Take their passports, take their driving licences. They have these powers & don't use them.

Even better charge them with child neglect so they are classed as criminal offenders against children so they fail police vetting for jobs.

I advised a lady going through impending divorce to go for 50/50 yesterday and was jumped on by others who meant the fathers would then not have to pay anything, failing to understand the exact scenario the OP is in.

I don’t think anyone will be successful in changing anything in the UK unless it’s the fathers who have to look after the children and it’s the women who pay child support. Won’t take long to see things change then I bet.

Probably because the court system was created by men to benefit men.