Maintenance

Maintenance is financial support for a spouse or for children. This page explains the basics in Malta.

In short

• What it covers. Maintenance includes food, clothing, health and housing. For children it also includes the expenses of health and education.
• How much. It is in proportion to the needs of the person claiming it and the means of the person who has to pay. There is no fixed formula in the Code. A recent amendment to the Civil Code allows the Minister for Justice to make regulations on how maintenance is calculated, so this may change. See child and spousal maintenance.
• Parents must support their children. Both parents must look after, maintain and educate their children, and this can continue for a child under twenty-three in full-time education or training, and for a child with a disability.
• Spouses support each other in proportion to their means and their ability to work, inside or outside the home.
• It can change. If the means of the person paying, or the needs of the person receiving, change, the court can vary or stop maintenance. See variation and enforcement.
• It can be enforced. The court can have maintenance paid straight from a salary or by standing order, and not paying can be a criminal offence.

While a case is going on

During a separation or divorce case, either spouse can ask for a maintenance allowance in proportion to their needs and the other spouse’s means. The court’s decision on maintenance must be reasoned, and must also set out how each parent contributes to the children’s health, education and extracurricular expenses. An agreement on maintenance reached in mediation can be turned into a court decree.

After separation or divorce

Separation does not release a spouse from supplying maintenance where it is due. The right to maintenance can be renounced by a spouse, and maintenance ordered or agreed on separation counts as adequate for the divorce conditions. A former spouse’s maintenance ends if they remarry, or enter a relationship that gives rise to an obligation of maintenance by someone else, unless it was ordered as a lump sum. Where a spouse is found responsible for the breakdown on certain grounds, the right to claim maintenance can be lost.

Unmarried parents

Parents who are not married have the same duty to maintain their children, and disputes go through the same mediation and court process.

Where to start

If you need maintenance, or you are being asked to pay it, the first step is a conversation about the actual figures. We can explain what the court looks at and what to bring.