Financial Remedies
October 2025

The Judge gives detailed discussions as to the law surrounding s29 Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 and extending a child maintenance order beyond a child’s eighteenth birthday. Specifically, it is held that an application under this section can be made informally and considered by a judge without a written application.

Background

The child in question is a child of the marriage between parties; the appellant is the father and the respondent in the mother. The child was born in February 2006. The initial hearing took place before HHJ Oliver on 24 January 2024 and was the subject of an application for enforcement directions on 6 November 2023. At this hearing the respondent informally applied for the extension of the duration of the child maintenance order through her skeleton argument and oral submissions. The hearing was adjourned, after hearing submissions from both parties, to allow the appellant the chance to apply for the child maintenance to be varied downwards and to provide medical evidence to support this. The appellant did not do this due him stating he had the means to pay this amount as he had returned to work.

The full history of the appeal is set out at paragraphs [4]-[10] of the judgment but the most salient features are as follows:

The adjourned hearing took place on 26 April 2024, where HHJ Oliver extended the child maintenance order until 31 August 2028. The appellant objected to this.

The appellant’s application to appeal was made out of time but as stated he had received the order late, Ms Justice Henke granted the appellant’s application for permission to appeal out of time. At the same time, she ordered provision of transcripts and the filing of skeleton arguments, along with a stay of the relevant aspects of HHJ Oliver’s order.

On 20 January 2025 Ms Justice Henke considered the appellants application for permission to appeal the order and whilst she dismissed several grounds as being without merit, she granted the application for permission to appeal on two grounds which were: the appellant was not given notice of any application to extend, and the length of the order extends beyond the tertiary education.

The parties’ Arguments

The Judge described the appellant’s permission to appeal document as a skeleton argument. One of the grounds of appeal focused on procedural irregularity in that he argued the respondent failed to serve her skeleton argument on the appellant as required by previous orders. He argued the respondent failed to serve a specific variation application and this was hidden in the skeleton argument. A further application to vary was sent to the appellant but he argued was purposely sent by the respondent to an email she knew was not monitored by him.

The appellant also argued that the order extended beyond the child’s eighteenth birthday and argued the ‘judge gave no reason in the hearing except that the respondent needs it and the Judge himself can make such an order’. The appellant argued that the Judge failed to consider the fact that case law establishes exceptional circumstances must be present before such an order can be made. The appellant submitted the total level of maintenance (including both spousal and child) exceeded the needs of the respondent and the child.

The respondent asserts the skeleton argument for the first hearing, which contained her application, was sent to the correct email address on the 23 January before the hearing on 24 January. She asserted the appellant had notice of it, which she seeks to demonstrate by the oral argument she presented before HHJ Oliver in January 2024 and letters to the appellant which referenced this application.

Hearings before HHJ Oliver

Ms Justice Henke outlined the hearings before HHJ Oliver from Paragraphs [17]-[23]. She notes the reference to the respondents skeleton argument which clearly sets out her application for child maintenance to continue beyond the child’s eighteenth birthday, relying on s29 Matrimonial Causes Act 1973.

As well as this, when reviewing the transcripts she noted that the respondent raised the issue of child maintenance and the fact that the child will be in tertiary education until 2028. She stated in the hearing the respondent outlined her reasons for arguing that the child maintenance should not end on the child’s eighteenth birthday and she orally made submissions on this point. The appellant heard these submissions and the respondent’s specific reference to her skeleton argument. At that time the appellant did not respond to these submissions and most importantly did not raise he had not seen the skeleton argument.

Ms Justice Henke references the discussion between HHJ Oliver and the appellant on the hearing on 26 April 2024 in which the respondent claims that he was not aware of the application for extension of the child maintenance. It is clear here that at this stage the appellant objected on the grounds there had been no application.

The law

Ms Justice Henke sets out section 29 matrimonial causes act 1973 at paragraph [29]. She summarises this section by stating that ‘Section 29 provides that no financial provision order or property adjustment order shall be made for children who have reached the age of eighteen unless they are in continuing education or there are special circumstances such as physical or mental disability. It also provides that in the first instance a child maintenance order should be specified to extend to the age of eighteen’.

Outlining previous case law on this area such as UD V DN (Schedule 1 Children Act 1989: Capital Provision) [2021 EWCA Ci 1947 and Tattersall v Tattersall [2018] EWCA Civ 1978 Ms Justice Henke concludes that ‘the authorities clearly demonstrated that the court had power to make an order for financial provision which would benefit that child when they were over the age of eighteen if that child was in education or training or there were special circumstances’.

Of importance was the case of Tattersall v Tattersall [2018] EWCA Civ 1978 in which it was held that ‘there is no principle which requires a judge to adjourn an enforcement application pending determination of a variation application.’

Discussion and Outcome

When discussing the appellants argument that he had no notice because he had never seen the respondent’s skeleton argument including the application, Ms Justice Henke states that ‘whether he specifically had received that skeleton argument for the January 2020 hearing, during the hearing itself the application to extend the duration of the order was referred to with the respondence referring to that application’. Ms Justice Henke therefore held that from that hearing the appellant knew of the application and the respondents relevant arguments and therefore he knew that an application had been made. Therefore, the ground of appeal that the appellant was not given notice was not made out.

Although it is accepted that the application was made informally, Ms Justice Henke held that this was sufficient to engage the court’s powers under s29 Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 to extend the maintenance order. Therefore, HHJ Oliver had the power to increase the duration of the order and also had the evidential basis to do so.

Accordingly, the appeal was dismissed and the extended child maintenance order made by HHJ Oliver remained in full force.

Conclusion

This case is a useful reminder to practitioners to take note of any application raised informally through skeleton arguments or similar documents and object at the first possibility. This case extends the principle of informal applications which has been directly applicable to other sections of the matrimonial causes act 1973 to s29 specifically.