*The sitting took place at the Family Law Court.
A FATHER EARNING €161,000 per annum has told a judge that he can’t afford to pay €450 in maintenance payments per week towards his three children.
At the Family Law Court, the separated father said that he couldn’t afford the combined €450 in maintenance for his children sought in addition to the €750 in mortgage payments he is paying per month towards the 7,000 square foot family home.
The man said he is in deficit and admitted that “something has to change in my own spending”.
The man said that he is paying rent of €2,200 per month for a two bedroom apartment.
The man earns €700 per day as a self-employed person and works 231 days per year.
Last year, he lost a job with an annual salary of €180,000 and was not working for a number of months before securing the €700 per day contract work.
Solicitor, Anne Walsh issued the summons to the man for maintenance arrears on behalf of the man’s ex-wife after he paid no payments to his wife from last November to March of this year.
Ms Walsh said that the man paid nothing towards his ex-wife last Christmas and in response the man said: “Believe me, Christmas was not good for me either. I didn’t have a penny to my name”.
Judge Vincent Deane told the man that he was making an order that the man pay €105 per child per week – or €415 for the three – in maintenance payments and half of all medical, back to school and dental bills. Judge Deane said that he took into account the €750 in mortgage repayments.
Judge Deane told the man that he wouldn’t be changing his order telling the father “this is not the Ballinasloe horse fair”.
The man said that had no savings from his €180,000 per annum job.
The man told the court, “I do agree I should have done a better job. That’s for sure and given my ex more money”.
He said, “Every penny I will earn I will give to her and I have done so for the last four months.”
He said, “I think it is disgraceful the situation that she finds herself in but I lost my job for four months”.
In evidence, the ex-wife told the court that “I have bills beyond my control now with bills piling up”.
The woman said that the family home “is massive. It is a huge undertaking just to try to maintain the house – I just can’t do it”.
Judge Deane agreed that it is a massive house and the woman said that she has fallen into arrears on the mortgage with arrears totalling around €14,000.
The woman said that her ex-husband sees little of their children as he lives elsewhere in the country.
She said, “They are 100 per cent depending on me. I have to be there morning, noon and night”.
When Ms Walsh pointed out that the man’s spend of €645 of groceries per month was much higher than the spend by his wife for herself and their three children the man said in response, “I have a big problem with that – that I am eating better than she is and that is not right”.
