‘Just the tip of the iceberg’: Tasmania’s child support shame revealed in new report

Tasmanian children are being left short-changed through unpaid child support and what the Women’s Legal Service sees is ‘just the tip of the iceberg’. A new report reveals the full extent.

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Tasmanian children are missing out on the thousands of dollars in child support which the Women’s Legal Service describes as economic abuse and a form of family violence.

A WLS Australia report released this month titled: Non-payment of child support as economic abuse of women and children: a literature review reveals a national child support debt of $2bn.

Child support refers to money to be paid by one parent to another to support children after a separation.

WLS Tasmania CEO Yvette Cehtel said non-payment of child support meant children were missing out.

“This affects the ability of the mother to pay rent, buy food and clothes, pay for school and activities, have a car, pay for heating and medicine,” she said.

Yvette Cehtel, chief executive of Women's Legal Service Tasmania. Picture: Supplied

“Payment of child support is avoided using various tactics including cash work, reducing business turnover, avoiding lodging tax returns and establishing trusts or putting money in a new partner’s name.

“We get calls every month about non-payment of child support and it is just the tip of the iceberg because they are the only ones who reach out for help.

“Some perpetrators of family violence continue to coerce and control their ex-partner and punish them in some cases for leaving.

“We’ve got to stop thinking that when people leave that they’re safe because they’re not financially safe and they might continually be controlled through non-payment of child support.”

The report says the non-payment of child support is a gendered issue and single mothers are faced with “onerous and complex administrative burdens” to resolve disputes.

“It can have a profound impact on the lives of women who are often already facing significant economic disadvantage due to patriarchal social structures, gender pay gap, primary care responsibilities, domestic unpaid labour, and a system that does not adequately ensure women have appropriate financial supports in place after they leave violent and abusive relationships,” it said.

“The child support system has failed to adequately respond to the known financial and relationship complexities of child support.

“The effects on mothers and their children are material, disempowering and results in further trauma for victim-survivors of family violence.”

In one case study a victim-survivor of economic abuse told of earning significantly less than her ex-husband who stopped all child support payments when he realised “that we were not going to get back together”.

Another told of the “significant financial burden” after her former husband refused to share the cost of vet, medicine, food and pet sitting while she was away for work for their pets.

“I have spent well over $50,000 on raising the pets post-separation,” she said.

Ms Cehtel said the report was “really harrowing” but not surprising.

She said the Australian Taxation Office needed to ensure men lodged tax returns and inquire into businesses running at a loss after years of profits.