The Child Support (Maintenance Calculations and Special Cases) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2001

Shared care

7.—(1) For the purposes of paragraphs 7 and 8 of Schedule 1 to the Order a night will count for the purposes of shared care where the non-resident parent—

(a) has the care of a qualifying child overnight; and

(b) the qualifying child stays at the same address as the non-resident parent.

(2) For the purposes of paragraphs 7 and 8 of Schedule 1 to the Order, a non-resident parent has the care of a qualifying child when he is looking after the child.

(3) Subject to paragraph (4), in determining the number of nights for the purposes of shared care, the Department shall consider the 12 month period ending with the relevant week and for this purpose “relevant week” has the same meaning as in the definition of day to day care in regulation 1(2).

(4) The circumstances in which the Department may have regard to a number of nights over less than a 12 month period are where there has been no pattern for the frequency with which the non-resident parent looks after the qualifying child for the 12 months preceding the relevant week, or the Department is aware that a change in that frequency is intended, and in that case it shall have regard to such lesser period as may seem to the Department to be appropriate, and the Table in paragraph 7(4) and the period in paragraph 8(2) of Schedule 1 to the Order shall have effect subject to the adjustment described in paragraph (5).

(5) Where paragraph (4) applies, the Department shall adjust the number of nights in that lesser period by applying to that number the ratio which the period of 12 months bears to that lesser period.

(6) Where a child is a boarder at a boarding school, or is a patient in a hospital, the person who, but for those circumstances, would otherwise have care of the child overnight, shall be treated as providing that care during the periods in question.