The distraught mother of a daughter with Down’s syndrome has called for help after the courts ruled that the teenager had got too old for child maintenance payments.

While Latisha Lightbourne said 19-year-old Solay needed continuing care, the Supreme Court found that there was not the necessary legislative framework to regulate the welfare of a vulnerable adult.

The decision left Ms Lightbourne not only without child maintenance payments, but owing thousands of dollars in legal fees.

Breaking into tears, she said yesterday: “As everyone is preparing for a joyous Christmas season, I am already wondering what 2017 holds because of my struggles with my daughter. It’s a very sad state.

“Until the law changes and is amended, there is nothing I can do in this instance to enforce payment. Financially, I am drained trying to maintain a lawyer I need to defend something that one thinks would happen so naturally. I am challenged. I don’t know what else to do but to plead that urgency be given to amend the Mental Health Act law. It’s in aid of not only my daughter, but any other parent who may find themselves coming up against the same obstacle.”

Ms Lightbourne said in September last year, as her daughter approached her 18th birthday, she applied to the Family Court to have the child maintenance payments extended owing to her daughter’s medical condition.

“I knew I had to be proactive to come up with her next plan of financial support,” she said. “While I thought it would be an easy process, going through the legal system as we have always done. With the help of her doctor, I was able to get written confirmation of her mental status, which was presented to the courts and accepted in the first instance.

“The courts, even knowing and accepting the classification that she is disabled, she was still considered an adult who had aged out of the family court process.”

Ms Lightbourne appealed the ruling, but Chief Justice Ian Kawaley dismissed it. While the Chief Justice found that the appeal lacked legal merit, he noted “it had usefully served to highlight the need for a legislative framework to regulate the welfare of vulnerable adult persons”.

She said that following the ruling she sought for the matter to be addressed through the Mental Health Act, which she believed would cover her daughter as a vulnerable person.

“To my dismay, a loophole has prevented me from getting the support of our system to enforce a father who chooses not to voluntarily pay child support,” she said. “There is no law that he must continue to pay child support because, even though she is mentally classified as a child, she is 19 years old now.

“Where I started out in sincerity to get the support of the legal system, thinking that her dad would voluntarily continue with the payments, it appears as if he has the support of the legal system as I now actually owe him money through the courts. At present, I have no legal ground to enforce and encourage her father to maintain the maintenance order or any order through the legal system.”

She urged those in power to address the issue quickly so that she, and others who find themselves in a similar position, can get some form of support.

“It has never been thought of, it was never considered up until my case,” she said. “I can’t go into 2017, 2018 with no end in sight. All I want to see in the end is a fair result with amendments being made as fast as they possibly can. I may be one person, but this does and will affect every vulnerable person that comes along once they are no longer 18.

“This is not just for the benefit of my child. This is for any person that will come along, or who may be out there as we speak.”

A spokeswoman for the Ministry of Health and Seniors responded to a request for comment this morning, stating that services and support are available for persons in Ms Lightbourne’s situation.

“Government financial support for adults with disabilities is available from the Department of Financial Assistance and the Department of Social Insurance,” the spokeswoman said.

“There is home care coverage under the Government Health Insurance Program (HIP) and FutureCare providing the person meets eligibility criteria, including adult daycare services. In addition, Ageing and Disability Services runs a Government-managed training centre for persons with learning and physical disabilities.”

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