MAINTENANCE AND SUPPORT - Child support - Changed circumstances - Reduction or rescission of arrears

Law360 Canada ( June 4, 2021, 2:25 PM EDT) -- Appeal by the father from a judgment of the Ontario Court of Appeal that set aside a decision of a motion judge that reduced the father’s child support arrears. The parties were married for 13 years prior to their divorce in 1996. The mother was granted sole custody of the parties’ two children. The father was required to pay $115 per week per child in child support. In 1998, the father requested a reduction in his child support obligations but provided no financial disclosure to support his request. Between 1998 and 2016, the father made no voluntary child support payments. The father’s child support obligations ended in 2012 when the children were no longer children of the marriage. In 2016, the father applied to retroactively reduce his child support obligation and rescind the arrears, which totalled $170,000. The motion judge retroactively decreased support, effectively reducing the arrears to $41,642. The Court of Appeal overturned the decision and ordered that the father pay the full amount of arrears....

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