Starting June 1, father will get paternity leave, while mothers will benefit from extended maternity leave. Photo: Barbados Today

Acting Chief Magistrate Deidre McKenna made the suggestion on Monday during a panel discussion entitled Financial Child Support Delinquency, organised by the Men of Character Men’s Fellowship at the Mount of Praise Wesleyan Holiness Church.

McKenna, who hears child maintenance cases twice a week, said that at present, in determining if a man is the father of a child, the question may simply be asked of him.

She told the discussion that even when a man accepts fatherhood – which he may do for various reasons – for the sake of certainty, she might enquire if he requires a DNA test.

“I may ask him ‘do you wish to get a DNA test . . . you sure you want to accept that you are the father without proof . . .? If you think you have doubts, you have all rights to seek a DNA test, and then we can all be sure going forward whether or not you are the father,” she said.

It was then that McKenna made the case for mandatory testing.

She said: “I would like to see Barbados get to the stage where once a man is brought before the courts for maintenance, that it is automatic that a DNA test is done . . . before we even say to the man, or ask the question ‘do you think you are the father . . . do you accept that you are the father?’ I think it should be automatic that a DNA test be done, and let us start there. And once he is adjudged to be the father by the DNA test, we can go forward to how we can sort out maintenance.”

She noted that at present, the individual seeking the DNA test has to cover the cost.

“My suggestion going forward would be that the State pay for it,” said the acting chief magistrate. “And I know that’s why that might not go much further. I am thinking the State should pay for it. Once the person has made the application, make it automatic and let the State fund it. Because, right now, if you go to ChemScreen Laboratory Services Inc., that runs you into $800 per test.

“And we have had situations where some women are willing to pay half and let the man pay half. But most of the time the man has to pay the full $800.”

McKenna recalled adjudicating a case where a man was paying child support for a daughter who was nine years old at the time: “The woman brought him to court for a second child when she reached age three. In most cases, when the relationship has ended, is where you normally start to get issues whether it is consistency in paying and the woman feels she must bring him to court to get it to be more consistent.

“So, it was a situation where the couple broke up, probably about a year before; so the child would have been two years old at the time, and she claimed he was not being consistent with the payment. So, she brought him to court a year later.”

The acting chief magistrate continued: “When I asked him if he accepted that he is the father, he said ‘no’, and that that was the reason for the breakdown in the relationship. He had his doubts. And in talking to him, I asked if he wanted to get a DNA test done; and he said ‘yes’, he wanted a DNA test. And she made a comment to him . . . ‘you could as well get one for the other one. Yuh like the other so bad, yuh could as well get one for the other one’.

“This gentleman never questioned the nine-year-old. He was only questioning the three-year-old. So, because of her comment, he decided he was going to get the DNA test on both. When the results came back, he was actually the father of the three-year-old, but not the nine-year-old. And that man sat down and cried like a baby in court, because he was so sure that he was that nine-year-old’s father. So, for nine years he carried that ‘jacket’.”

McKenna also said it was not always possible to be sure that all money paid to a parent was used for its intended purpose: “But the way you can prove some of your money at least is being used for what it is supposed to be used for, is because any maintenance order that is made also includes the person halving dental, medical and educational expenses, reasonably incurred.”

She had also presided over cases where women were ordered to pay child maintenance to fathers, she said.