Many young people are now back at university or embarking on their further education journey. It is an exciting time for many young adults but it is not without its stresses, and students may find themselves concerned about how they are to fund university life, apprenticeships or other qualifications.
This increased financial independence can pose questions for students who may feel they should be receiving more financial support from their parents than they are getting. It may also be something that parents who have been paying or receiving child maintenance will have to consider.
Who is eligible?
Parents have a duty to support their children financially and there are two broad structures under which this is regulated.
The first is through child maintenance and the Child Maintenance Service (CMS) is the government body which deals with this. Child maintenance is payable from the non-resident parent to the resident parent until a child turns 16, or 20 if that child is approved training or education. Crucially, approved education or training does not include university. This means that the CMS doesn’t have anything to do with support for children once they have left school and gone to university.
The second mechanism for financial support is through the law in relation to aliment (which is the Scottish legal term for maintenance). Parents may not be aware that their duty to provide financial support to their children extends to the age of 25, so long as that child is ‘reasonably and appropriately undergoing instruction at an educational establishment, or training for employment or for a trade, profession or vocation’.
What this means in practice is that, when a young person begins studying, financial support stops being paid from one of their parents to the other and instead becomes payable from parent to child. This is the case even if the child is still living at home with one of their parents.
How much is payable?
A balance requires to be struck between the student’s needs and their parents’ resources. The student will require to show what their reasonable outgoings are compared to their income and the paying parent or parents will be required to do the same. This can be a difficult exercise where discretion will always be required as to how far ‘reasonable’ is expected to extend. It’s also difficult when a decision has to be made as to the split of the overall liability between the parents – 50/50 may well be unfair.
Previous reported cases have established that the student will often be expected to assist with their own living costs by finding part-time work. However, each case will turn on its own facts and there may be students who are unable to work for a number of reasons.
In practice
The first stage is to work out which of these frameworks apply and where a potential claim may lie.
It is likely to be a daunting prospect for a young person to consider making a claim against a parent for aliment. We would always encourage families to try to reach a solution as amicably as possible, but we recognise that isn’t always possible.
Mediation can be a helpful and cost-effective way to deal with these issues. We have trained family law mediators across our various locations who would be capable of assisting.
Often the most helpful first step is to get the appropriate legal and financial advice for your own situation.
At Thorntons, we have a dedicated and experienced Family Law team. For more information please contact a member of the Family team on 03330 430150.
