BC Supreme Court rules on support payment after the father left his high-paying job behind

In a dispute involving child and spousal support, the BC Supreme Court imputed income on the father after he moved to Ukraine to engage in business related to the country’s war effort, leaving his high-paying job behind.

In A.J.B.B. v B.B.M, 2024 BCSC 478, the respondent operated a railway maintenance and construction business, which subsequently faced financial difficulties. This, coupled with personal issues, including substance use, prompted him to move to Ukraine, where he engaged in various business ventures and jobs related to the country’s war effort, yielding modest earnings.

The claimant sought to impute an income to the respondent based on his previous annual withdrawals from the company, approximately $250,000. In contrast, the respondent argued his support obligations should reflect his current earnings.

The BC Supreme Court concluded that income should indeed be imputed to the respondent, noting his capability of earning incomes available in his pre-entrepreneurial roles — as a shipping foreman and a railway company employee. The judgment pointed out the respondent’s intentional underemployment in Ukraine and directed both parties to submit supplementary affidavits to determine the respondent’s employability and potential earnings in the Lower Mainland area.

The evidence presented included the respondent’s former employment as a terminal foreman in Vancouver with an annual income of $267,000. However, his resignation from the union and the lack of current job vacancies hindered his attempt to return to such positions. The court found the parties had not fully engaged with the request for further evidence but proceeded to impute an income of $112,000 per year to the respondent for support purposes, based on the available information and applying common sense to the limited data about his current opportunities.

The court considered the respondent's potential earnings in the Lower Mainland, drawing an inference from his previous employment and current, significantly lower, earnings in Ukraine. Ultimately, the court set the respondent's child support payments for two children at the table amount for the imputed income and indicated that spousal support, if applicable, would also be based on this income.

Furthermore, the court dismissed the claimant's request for the respondent to post security for his support payments due to the lack of evidence that the funds for such security were readily available. Despite this, the claimant was awarded costs due to her substantial success on the summary trial application.