RIGHTS-ARGENTINA: City Goes After Deadbeat Parents

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Mar 29 2000 (IPS) - Parents who do not provide economic support for their children after divorce now go down on public record in the Argentine capital, and are ineligible for loans or a driver’s license, and may not work as judges or city employees or as supplier for the municipal government.

Non-governmental organisations and attorneys agree the measure implemented Wednesday is an important step in the right direction but the system must be extended throughout the entire country for it to be truly effective. The Argentine Congress is currently considering a bill to that effect.

The Registry of Support Payment Debtors premiered with a list of six parents who owe more than three consecutive support payments or five payments total to their children. The city’s assistant secretary of Justice, Hugo Germano, pointed out that if all family court judges sent data on defaulting parents, there would be “several thousand” in the registry.

In order for an individual to be put on the list, a family judge must send the municipal government information on the debtor, who would then be unable to conduct business with any of the capital government’s public institutions. Within three months, banks and private companies will be able to consult the registry in making business decisions.

In Buenos Aires, 17,000 claims have been filed over the last six years on parental failure to pay child support, according to court statistics. It is estimated that 70 percent of men who are separated from their families do not comply with the stipulated payment, or pay late or only part.

The vast majority of the debtors are men because young children tend to live with the mother, except in a handful of cases.

The measure is unprecedented in Latin America, though the United States and European Union nations apply similar systems. In France, for example, the government pays a monthly subsidy to mothers with children who are not receiving support payments, and then charges the father the difference through taxes or by withholding wages.

In Argentina, after a marriage or other union falls apart in separation or divorce, the neglect of children is common. Experts from various fields attribute the phenomenon to economic and employment issues, but also to cultural questions.

Over the last 10 years, homes headed by women jumped from nine to 25 percent of the total in Buenos Aires. On average, income for these families is 30 percent less than for male-led homes.

In a recent survey conducted by the Homemakers’ Union, 87 percent of the respondents said they support the creation of a registry for defaulting parents. This organisation promoted the city project, together with women legislators from an array of political parties.

In general, men’s commitment to domestic life and their participation in raising children is less than women’s, and they attend to these issues with much less frequency once they leave the family, Monique Altschul, president of ‘Mujeres en Igualdad’ (Women in Equality), told IPS.

One woman attorney who has handled many child support cases commented that there are male judges who are unlikely to sanction the defaulting fathers, and women judges who go to the extreme to help the father figure out what he can do to obtain the money he says he does not have.

Of every 10 legal suits for child support – filed mostly by middle- or upper-class women – seven go unfulfilled, while some cases lead to criminal proceedings for the “fraudulent insolvency” of the father, said family lawyer Carmen González.

But a low-income mother who is divorced or separated is least likely to file such a complaint because she assumes that the father of her children does not have the money to meet the payment set by the judge.

Fraudulent insolvency occurs when the father involved in a child support suit changes the titles on his property or business, if he has one, and declares before the judge that he has no income to make the support payment for the children who live with their mother.

“I had a client who told me her ex-husband, who did not pay child support, came to visit the children driving a Mercedes Benz car and said it belonged to the secretary of the company, which, he assured her, was going bankrupt,” said González.

Altschul pointed out that the issue does not necessarily involve violent men or unemployed men, but that they are simply “absent fathers” who do not play their role, which is so important for the education and well-being of their children.

For González, the fundamental problem is cultural, and laws tend to ensure this injustice continues to be committed against children and adolescents. “The Argentine male is not such a bad payor, the issue is that he pays where he should not pay – for example, he supports the children of the woman with whom he currently lives,” she explained.

In other words, a man remarries or becomes involved in a new long- term relationship, and may be an excellent father to the children of the new spouse, but he neglects the children from his previous relationship.

“I frequently hear my clients say they go through economic hardships and have to send their children to public schools, and meanwhile, the ex-husband’s children through his new wife go to Disneyland,” she said.

In addition, men tend to think that once the ex-wife remarries – especially if the new husband is economically well-off -, they, as fathers, are relieved of their duty to provide for the children.

González also pointed out that the law is “androcentric” and does not take into account the detrimental situation of the woman. “A void is created for the conditions in which children and women find themselves after a separation.”

It is common for men to avoid legal penalties by showing the “will to pay” before a judge. “If the stipulated sum is 2,000 pesos (equal to dollars) per month, the man says he does not have the money, but he has 50 in his pocket he is willing to pay, and then he gets away,” said the lawyer.

Because of all this, González thinks the registry of defaulting parents established in Buenos Aires should be extended throughout the entire country in order to be completely effective.

She also believes the law should require men who intend to remarry to show some kind of certification that they are free of debt, a process that would reveal their neglected commitments.

“If a man seeks the protection of law to get married, he should be tried for the laws he did not obey in his previous marriage,” she said.

The government should penalise these men because the international Convention on the Rights of the Child includes the right of minors to be supported by their parents in order to have a chance at a good life, said González.