Commonwealth Consolidated Acts

CHILD SUPPORT (ASSESSMENT) ACT 1989 - SECT 29

  (1)   Subject to this section, in determining whether an application for administrative assessment of child support complies with sections   24, 25 and 25A, the Registrar may act on the basis of the application and the documents accompanying the application, and is not required to conduct any inquiries or investigations into the matter.

  (2)   The Registrar is to be satisfied that a person is a parent of a child only if the Registrar is satisfied:

  (a)   that the person is or was a party to a marriage and the child was born to the person, or the other party to the marriage, during the marriage; or

  (b)   that the person's name is entered in a register of births or parentage information, kept under the law of the Commonwealth or of a State, Territory or prescribed overseas jurisdiction, as a parent of the child; or

  (c)   that, whether before or after the commencement of this Act, a federal court, a court of a State or Territory or a court of a prescribed overseas jurisdiction has:

  (i)   found expressly that the person is a parent of the child; or

  (ii)   made a finding that it could not have made unless the person was a parent of the child;

    and the finding has not been altered, set aside or reversed; or

  (d)   that, whether before or after the commencement of this Act, the person has, under the law of the Commonwealth or of a State, Territory or prescribed overseas jurisdiction, executed an instrument acknowledging that the person is a parent of the child, and the instrument has not been annulled or otherwise set aside; or

  (e)   that the child has been adopted by the person; or

  (f)   that the person is a man and the child was born to a woman within 44 weeks after a purported marriage to which the man and the woman were parties was annulled; or

  (g)   that the person is a man who was a party to a marriage to a woman and:

  (i)   the parties to the marriage separated; and

  (ii)   after the parties to the marriage separated, they resumed cohabitation on one occasion; and

  (iii)   within 3 months after the resumption of cohabitation, they again separated and afterwards lived separately and apart; and

  (iv)   the child was born to the woman within 44 weeks after the period of cohabitation but after the dissolution of the marriage; or

  (h)   that the person is a man and:

  (i)   the child was born to a woman who cohabited with the man at any time during the period beginning 44 weeks and ending 20 weeks before the birth; and

  (ii)   no marriage between the man and the woman subsisted during any part of the period of cohabitation; or

  (i)   that the person is a parent of the child under section   60H or section   60HB of the Family Law Act 1975 .

  (3)   If:

  (a)   2 or more paragraphs of subsection   (2) are relevant to a particular application; and

  (b)   those paragraphs, or some of them, conflict with each other;

the paragraph that appears to the Registrar to be the more or most likely to be the correct presumption prevails.