Canadian Child Support Guidelines and Laws

The Guidelines are built on the principle that both parents should share the same portion of their income with their children as they would have if they had continued to live together. In broad terms, the guidelines ask “what would a parent with this income usually spend on his or her children?” and support payments are set accordingly. The receiving parent is presumed to contribute to the children in proportion to his or her income. Line 305 in the income tax rules states “you cannot claim this amount if the claim is for a child for whom you were required to make support payments for”. There is a contradiction in there and I would hope you see it. Since you are paying in child support the same amount of money as if they were living with you, why can't you at the very least be able to claim your child as a dependent. Currently, the payee gets all this tax free money and gets to claims the kids on their tax return? Also as previously stated is it presumed that receiving parent contributing to the child as well. There is no proof of that, yet they can claim their child for income tax purposes. There is something wrong with this taxation law. Individual circumstances need to be addressed when calculating support payments. It can not be as general as it is laid out now. There are many many flaws to this justice system. A standard of living evaluation for both parents should be made mandatory before payment is calculated. Check out the Canadian Child Support Guidelines Group on Facebook. I encourage you to email the Minister of Justice Honourable Robert Nicholson at nicholson.r@parl.gc.ca with your concerns of the current child support laws.