Detail

(1) Where a maintenance agreement is for the time being subsisting and each of the parties to the agreement is for the time being either domiciled or resident in Saint Lucia then, subject to subsection (3), either party may apply to the Court for an order under this section.

(2) If the Court is satisfied either—
1. (a) that by reason of a change in the circumstances in the light of which any financial arrangements contained in the agreement were made or, as the case may be, financial arrangements were omitted from it (including a change foreseen by the parties when making the agreement), the agreement should be altered so as to make different, or, as the case may be, so as to contain, financial arrangements; or
1. (b) that the agreement does not contain proper financial arrangements with respect to any child of the family,

then subject to subsections (3), (4) and (5), that Court may by order make such alterations in the agreement—
1. (i) by varying or revoking any financial arrangements contained in it, or
1. (ii) by inserting in it financial arrangements for the benefit of one of the parties to the agreement of a child of the family,
1. as may appear to that Court to be just having regard to all the circumstances, including, if relevant, the matters mentioned in section 25(3); and the agreement shall have effect thereafter as if any alteration made by the order had been made by agreement between the parties.

(3) Where the Court decides to alter, by order under this section, an agreement by inserting provision for the making or securing by one of the parties to the agreement of periodical payments for the maintenance of the other party or by increasing the rate of the periodical payments that the agreement provides are to be made by one of the parties for the maintenance of the other, the term for which the payments, or, as the case may be, so much of the payments as is attributable to the increase, are or is to be made under the agreement as altered by the order shall be such term as the Court may specify, but so that term shall not exceed—
1. (a) where the payments will not be secured, the joint lives of the parties to the agreement or a term ending with the remarriage of the party to whom the payments are to be made whichever is the shorter;
1. (b) where the payments will be secured, the life of the party to whom the payments are to be made, or a term ending with the marriage of that party, whichever is the shorter.

(4) Where the Court decides to alter, by order under this section, an agreement by inserting provision for the making or securing by one of the parties to the agreement of periodical payments for the maintenance of a child of the family or by increasing the rate of the periodical payments that the agreement provides are to be made or secured by one of the parties for the maintenance of such a child, then, in deciding the term for which under the agreement as altered by the order the payment or, as the case may be, so much of the payments as is attributable to the increase are or is to be made or secured for the benefit of the child, the Court shall apply the provisions of section 28(1), 28(2) and 28(3) as if the order to which this subsection relates were an order under section 23.

(5) For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that nothing in this section or in section 35 affects any power of the Court before which any proceedings between the parties to a maintenance agreement are brought under any other enactment (including a provision of this Act) to make an order containing financial arrangement or any right of either party to apply for such an order in such proceedings.