You may be entitled to Spousal Maintenance if you can prove that you do not have the capacity to earn enough income to support yourself properly. However, choosing not to work or to exercise a capacity to earn sufficient income will not entitle you to Spousal Maintenance.
Further, you will be unlikely to get an order for Spousal Maintenance if you have sufficient resources (other than income) to support yourself, such as access to a savings account or other assets.
The first step in establishing whether or not you may be entitled to Spousal Maintenance payments is to overcome the ‘threshold test’ which asks 2 questions:
- Are you unable to ‘adequately support’yourself on your income; and
- Is the other party ‘reasonably able’to pay you?
If it is determined that you are not able to ‘adequately’ support yourself and that the other party is ‘reasonably’ able to pay you, then the Court will give consideration to the extent to which your ex-partner should reasonably be expected to support you, i.e. how much should they pay you? This will ultimately involve an examination of your living expenses and those of your ex-partners.
