I separated from my ex for good in early 2018. Over the course of the 11 year relationship, during which we had three children, my ex left us on a couple of occasions for periods of approximately 9 months. During these periods, he made it clear that if I were to go to child support, there would be consequences. To ensure that I could still access FTB payments, I informed them that I was receiving privately collected child support, although I never received a single dollar. He would gloat about the child support rate being so low anyway that it was negligible (due to his job instability and CSA calculating payments based on previous years which for him, happened to be times where he was out of work). He would argue that since I was the one with consistent work and receiving government support  (FTB), that the costs of raising our children should be my responsibility, even though at this time he had found work and was earning a consistent full time income (compared to my part time income).

Following our final separation in 2018, I went to child support to arrange formal collection. I was afraid of the consequences of doing this. He would do things like key my car and damage other property to hurt me financially. My ex never lodged tax returns, lied about his share of care and worked cash jobs to avoid paying child support. When I called CSA some months later to advise that I had 100% care and that there were domestic violence orders in place reflecting this, they said that they would not change the percentage of care shown on their systems as it ‘didn’t affect the rate of payments anyway’.  This was eventually changed only due to his imprisonment some time later. Since being released from jail, I have been receiving payments at a minimum rate of $18 per fortnight for three children. 

I know that my ex is working for family and is lying about his income. I don’t rely on child support and I never try to have the matter followed up or investigated. This is because I am just so grateful that my children have been able to live safe, consistent and joyful lives for the past 7 years – free from any involvement from him, despite no formal custody orders in place (which is a whole other issue – not being able to get full legal custody despite an extensive history of documented domestic violence and imprisonment for dangerous crimes). I genuinely fear for their lives should they ever be in his care and thus, I would forgo any financial assistance to avoid ever provoking that from occurring. 

That is the reality of the current system. Simply holding out and managing until my children are all 18 – despite the fact that I am the one doing everything right and providing for our children, managing study, work and raising three children concurrently.

– A mother who wants more for her children and for the women of Australia.

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At Fix Child Support, we acknowledge the strength and courage of those who share their personal experiences. These stories shed light on the challenges faced by many in the child support system, and we are committed to amplifying these voices in the fight for reform. If you would like to share your story with us, please email us!

I am a professional mother of 3 and once lived a privileged, married, double income life, having NO idea what single mothers were put through personally, until 4 years ago.  When my emotionally abusive husband left us while I was fighting cancer – he financially (and further mentally) destroyed my children! Following this, I have discovered just how disgracefully unfair the child support system is and I STILL can’t believe that AUSTRALIAN Government allows this to happen.

As your campaign has pointed out the many ways men (or paying parent) manipulate the system,  this is my personal experience and my biggest gripe and fear. In my opinion could be a very simple and easy fix by the government;

My children’s father does not submit an annual tax return on time to hide his income and have a sense of control over my budget and ability to conduct my life.

This is what it does financially to my children:

• They may not be receiving the correct amount of support (whether it’s more or less—it just needs to be accurate)
• I risk being put in debt by having to pay back either child support or Family Tax Benefit (FTB), further impacting my children’s needs
• Jeopardises my ability to budget and pay the mortgage, putting my children and myself AT RISK

If I submit a tax return and he doesn’t, I could end up owing him money because my income is correct, while his remains “provisional” until he lodges. As my children are getting older and more independent, my earning capacity rises.  I then lose significant child support for my children because his income is incorrect and mine is rising, my earning capacity increases, which means I lose significant child support based on his inaccurate income. This puts me at real risk of being unable to support my children and keep up with the mortgage. This is real and where I am right NOW. I am now too scared to do my tax return, because this WILL trigger a NEW assessment, resulting in a loss of child support that I need for my children to continue to live in their family home.  I have to delay doing my tax return until he submits his, to avoid losing child support. When he finally files, he’ll owe me back payments that I will never recover, as his income has been significantly higher each year.

THIS IS LUDICROUS – WHY DO WE HAVE A TAX SYSTEM IF THERE IS NO IMPACTFUL CONSEQUENCES FOR NOT SUBMITTING

I constantly live with financial abuse: By not submitting his TAX return, he continues to have control over the family budget. He openly enjoys having this control over my finances with no care around the impact this has on HIS children. He has admitted, through emails and text, that he enjoys controlling me in this manner because he thinks it prevents me spending money on MYSELF!  He has NO idea on the cost of his children and is under the assumption that child support is benefiting me personally! In reality, it is him controlling me and abusing his children.

–  Another woman and her children being financially and emotionally abused

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At Fix Child Support, we acknowledge the strength and courage of those who share their personal experiences. These stories shed light on the challenges faced by many in the child support system, and we are committed to amplifying these voices in the fight for reform. If you would like to share your story with us, please email us!

I became a single mum in 2015. My relationship was abusive, and things got much worse after the separation. He stalked and harassed me, causing trauma for both myself and my children. He only took jobs that paid all or partial wages in cash. For around four years, I received a maximum of $50 per week in child support for three kids—despite having 100% care. During this time, he would travel overseas for holidays while declaring a $0 annual income for at least three years.

In 2018, I was able to provide evidence that he had been lying about his income, and child support finally made a correction, increasing his monthly child support assessment and raising a debt of about $6,000. Soon after, he quit his job, took another full cash-paying role, declared $0 income again, and claimed financial hardship with Child Support. They waived his debt. During this time, two of my children were diagnosed with ASD2 and severe anxiety. My ability to work and study became limited, and I was at risk of bankruptcy and losing our home. I struggled to put food on the table, and at times, relied on support from friends and local churches.

Eventually, he took a mining job, which the ATO became aware of after one year of tax returns were filed. From then on, he was required to pay more in child support, although it has never been something I could rely on.

More recently, he took advantage of my eldest son, who is 17 and has ASD2, ADHD, anxiety, and intellectual difficulties. After not seeing his son for over eight years, he took him to a regional town in, NSW—a remote and isolated community. My son couldn’t access any support there through his NDIS plan, and his ‘father’ left him alone to rent an old shed from strangers. He was begging me and our friends in Queensland for warm clothes and food.

At the same time, my son’s ‘father’ applied for child support, claiming 100% care of my oldest son. This required me to prove that he wasn’t caring for our son but had abandoned him in a remote community, 15 hours away from me, his only parent and carer. Myself, friends who were also sending my son money for food, and his NDIS coordinator provided evidence that the ‘father’ was lying to CSA. The evidence was sufficient, and I requested CSA investigate why he had failed to lodge a tax return for nine out of the past ten years. They informed me that there was no penalty for lying to CSA.

It seems the ATO or CSA did something because, suddenly, three tax returns were filed, revealing he had been earning significantly more than he declared. This resulted in a $24,987 debt (currently). I don’t know what to do—calling CSA only upsets me because they don’t seem to care or understand how this affects our family. My children have gone without so much in their lives, and now there’s this large debt that should have supported them, but there’s nothing I can do to ensure they’ll ever receive it. I worry he’ll lie again, and CSA will just waive it.

These men use the system to their advantage to further abuse us and their children. CSA often doesn’t take our concerns seriously. I’m exhausted by this system, and I will never understand why anyone would want their own kids to suffer, or why government agencies would allow it.

– From a hard working mother of 3 who wants to share her experience with income manipulation through Child Support.

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At Fix Child Support, we acknowledge the strength and courage of those who share their personal experiences. These stories shed light on the challenges faced by many in the child support system, and we are committed to amplifying these voices in the fight for reform. If you would like to share your story with us, please email us!

When my five-year relationship with my ex ended, I knew things wouldn’t be easy. What I didn’t anticipate was the lengthy and frustrating battle to secure the child support payments to ensure financial stability for my ex and my child. Navigating a separation and Services Australia with a newborn was quite overwhelming. None of my friends, who had separated from their partners had “needed” child support to collect payments so I had no idea just how frustrating it would be. I was told I could get an exemption for 12 months but after that 12 month period, if I didn’t apply to child support then my Family Tax Benefit would be docked.

During our relationship, my ex convinced me to stop working and focus on building his business. I naively did that—growing it from $0 turnover to $500,000 in gross revenue [though I never saw the expenses]. I was told that this was “our future” and I was convinced to loan all my money to the business and in turn, he would pay our rent and pay me back.

After the separation, it became clear that getting him to fulfil his child support obligations or pay back the loan would be a challenge. My ex only declared around $60,000 on his tax returns, despite having a lifestyle that suggested a much higher income. I discovered most of his assets were hidden in other people’s names and paid for in cash, making it nearly impossible to trace his actual earnings. Through his job management system, I calculated $70,000 p/a in cash-jobs.

It wasn’t until he took me to family court to try and obtain the only wealth I had [my super], where he was required to provide financial disclosures, that I began to piece things together. From the bank statements I saw, he was spending over $100,000 a year on gambling, in the two years since separation he was taking overseas holidays at least six times a year, and his Uber Eats expenses alone were more than the child support debt he owed. When I ran the numbers, I estimated he was earning between $200,000 – $300,000 a year after taxes—significantly more than the amount he was declaring to both the ATO and Child Support.

I made 17 calls in the first 12 month period to Services Australia to follow up on collection and to request a departure prohibition order be placed on his passport, preventing overseas holidays until he repaid the $10,000 owing. Each time, I received the same response – “we’re looking into it”. It wasn’t until I wrote to Bill Shorten’s office that a DPO was swiftly placed on him and I was informed of legal pathways for possible collection and my options [one of them being a change of assessment under his capacity to earn]. However, each and every Services Australia representative has told me it will be hard to collect because my ex works for himself, will ignore garnishee orders, exploit known loopholes and continue to put assets in other’s names. Even the Family Court Registrar advised during mediation how it would all play out, as she’d previously worked at Services Australia and this behaviour had been happening for years.

While the Change of Assessment process left me with no financial privacy, all documents aren’t just shared with Services Australia but the other party, I had nothing to hide. I was living week-to-week, and had just been through financial disclosure in Family Court. He already had access to all my banking and mortgage information. There was a lot of paperwork though and I still found the process anxiety inducing and intimidating. I can appreciate for many women who’d previously experienced financial abuse that this would be too stressful.

My assessment was adjusted to match his financial resources more accurately—estimated conservatively at $200,000. However, it was largely academic, as there were no effective means of enforcing it. I’ve learnt that this is common for people who run their own business and a known loophole.

The Impact on Our Lives

The financial strain has been immense. I’ve had to move between my apartment and my parents’ house to make ends meet. Thankfully, my parents have a spare room and are able to provide some support. Meanwhile, my child’s father has shown no interest in spending time with his child.

My son is only two, and already I’m scraping together funds for essentials like swimming lessons. Often, I sacrifice my own needs, forgoing basics for myself. I dread when school will roll around and I need to buy iPads, “proper” birthday presents and my heart already breaks. I get birthday and Christmas presents for him from the op shop but of course, all his little friends I get new gifts. I’m always nervous that people will know I purchased their child’s birthday present in bulk on discount. With the high cost of daycare and no contribution from my ex, I can only afford to send my child three days a week, which limits my ability to work and earn more—perpetuating a vicious cycle.

I’ve built a small, supportive network through daycare, and many of my son’s friends have already been enrolled in schools, with their names put down for high schools. Meanwhile, I don’t even know where we’ll be able to afford to live in two to three years. It’s hugely disruptive for both myself and my son.

Whenever I call Child Support, they often say, “Don’t rely on the payments,” and I see similar sentiments echoed in Facebook groups. I see posts like, “I don’t want to pay child support,” and the first comment is, “Just get an ABN.” Of course, there’s always backlash, but it’s true—these are known loopholes. And the government chooses to do nothing about it. There are so many reports out there around the benefit of children growing up in financially stable households.

It seems like a single mother’s vote and the future generation are outweighed by the interests of those with more financial clout—like businessmen who can exploit loopholes to avoid their responsibilities. 

Child Support should be called evading parent support.

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At Fix Child Support, we acknowledge the strength and courage of those who share their personal experiences. These stories shed light on the challenges faced by many in the child support system, and we are committed to amplifying these voices in the fight for reform. If you would like to share your story with us, please email us!

I have been battling to receive support for my two sons since their father left when they were 1 and 7 years old and who has not seen them since.  My sons are currently owed just under $200,000 in unpaid child support, with zero payments received for years until recently.  The Child Support debt owed to his children provides him with no consequences. It is not listed on his credit rating or affects his financial equity in any way.  However, to financially secure my children I have been forced to be in debt and can’t get even a small loan.  My sons and I have lived with the consequences of poverty for so many years.  

This is due to his failure to support his sons and the failure of the Child Support Scheme to fulfil its obligation to ‘collect’.  For many years I wrote to Ministers Morrison, Porter and Tudge (who had relevant responsibility for child support in the previous government, Mr Morrison being the Senior Minister over the relevant portfolios at the time) – I received no responses.  I call them the ‘Bermuda Triangle’; Australian children’s voices go in…but nothing comes out.  

So far there hasn’t been a leader brave enough to have a serious look at the Child Support Scheme as it’s so gendered and they fear a backlash. It generally gets swept under the Family Law monster of issues, never to be discussed again. The Child Support Scheme, in its Charter has only two responsibilities – to Calculate and Collect – it’s not doing either well. My children, along with hundreds of thousands of Aussie kids, are a clear example of how this mechanism is, and has been, broken for well over a decade. 

Imagine the opportunities, education, food, housing, medical security and sport and music lessons  being lost to these children.  Imagine the difference the over $1.7 billion in outstanding debt (from only half the scheme) would make to them, not to mention the surrogate parent in all of this – the Australian taxpayer. 

It will just take one leader who has the courage to back our Aussie kids and purely look at the Child Support Scheme as a stand-alone mechanism…and fix it.

– From a hard-working Queensland mother of two sons, now aged 24 and 17, who describes herself and her children as ‘survivors’.

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At Fix Child Support, we acknowledge the strength and courage of those who share their personal experiences. These stories shed light on the challenges faced by many in the child support system, and we are committed to amplifying these voices in the fight for reform. If you would like to share your story with us, please email us!

My ex has been a Victorian police member for over 10 years and holds a very senior position, having previously worked in the family violence unit, supposedly helping women and children in need. Given his career, he knows the ins and outs of the system and uses that to further manipulate me. Since our separation, he has remarried, with his wife and his combined annual income estimated to be over $300K, not including rentals and side businesses under her ABN and name.

Despite his income, my ex constantly tries to reduce his child support payments. He has reduced his hours to part-time, claiming his income has dropped by $60k, but he works under his wife’s business, and this isn’t reflected in child support. Dropping his “estimated income” with child support was as easy as calling and telling them verbally that he would earn $60K less, despite them having last year’s income on file, they accepted this.

My Ex’s Financial Manipulation Means Our Boys Often Go Without 

I’ve had to cease swimming lessons and outside school activities due to costs and fuel. I cannot afford public school fees, and because these aren’t considered part of child support, my ex won’t help cover the $600 for school fees and uniforms. This year, the school changed uniforms, and though I’d saved my older son’s uniforms for his brother, I had to buy new uniforms for both boys, costing $1,000. Their school bags and hats were damaged by another student, but I can’t afford to replace them.

I’ve had to cancel my son’s school camp because I couldn’t afford the extra $450 by myself. I also can’t afford to throw birthday parties for my boys like their friends do. It’s heartbreaking, but I just can’t keep up.

The Burden on Me as a Parent

To make ends meet, I’ve picked up an extra day of work. This means I can’t take my sons to their therapies as I used to. I rely on therapists who visit them at school, but that limits options, and NDIS funding is eaten up by travel costs. My sons’ psychology appointments have had to stop because there are no school-based therapists, and I work business hours. Major appointments require my carer’s leave, and living in a rural town adds more expenses with long distances, fuel and parking.  I drop the boys off to before school care at 7:30 and I’m not finished to pick them up until 6pm. I bear the financial outlay to cover the costs of these increased before and after school care hours.

I try my best to ensure my boys have everything they need but I rely on Afterpay until the next child support payment arrives, which is often late. Meanwhile, their dad drives a new $70k car, spends weekends at Crown, and buys his wife $5,000 designer handbags.

Frustrations with the Child Support System

I am incredibly frustrated with the child support system. The paying parent can change their income estimate with no investigation or proof. I know of many paying parents who manipulate the system—working part-time or under an ABN and paying themselves less to reduce child support. Meanwhile, I have to provide evidence for every objection, while the paying parent doesn’t.

Child support accepts low estimates even when they don’t match previous years. My ex just submitted another low estimate. Child Support said this was his right, but if I tried to do the same, they’d refuse. Even when I asked for an investigation, they only looked at his accounts, not his wife’s, where their business and rental income goes.

The Ongoing Control

My ex is listed as having the children 20% of the time, but they’re really with their grandparents, who cover their expenses. The boys sleep on the floor at their grandparents’ house, but Child Support considers this fine. Challenging these issues gets nowhere—it’s like an extension of domestic violence, with more control after the relationship ends.

– From a hard-working Victorian mother of two, who wants her share her experience with income manipulation through Child Support

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At Fix Child Support, we acknowledge the strength and courage of those who share their personal experiences. These stories shed light on the challenges faced by many in the child support system, and we are committed to amplifying these voices in the fight for reform. If you would like to share your story with us, please email us!