Summary

This bill amends The Inter-jurisdictional Support Orders Act to implement the Hague Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance, replacing references to telephone communication with electronic means, and establishing procedures for cross-border enforcement of maintenance obligations.

This bill updates Saskatchewan's system for enforcing child support and spousal support orders across international borders. The centrepiece is incorporating the Hague Convention, an international agreement that standardizes how countries handle cross-border support cases. The bill creates two new authorities: a central authority (the designated authority handling incoming and outgoing requests) and a competent authority (not yet defined in the bill itself, but to be specified by regulation). These authorities will process applications for establishing, recognizing, or enforcing support orders from other countries. The bill also modernizes procedural language by replacing telephone-based evidence with any electronic communication method, and clarifies when Saskatchewan courts must or need not re-examine orders already registered in other Canadian provinces. Regulations will later specify who serves as the competent authority and which electronic methods are acceptable. The convention itself, reproduced in the bill's schedule, establishes when Saskatchewan must recognize foreign support orders, what grounds exist for refusing enforcement, and the rights of applicants to free legal assistance.