After her son's divorce, the mother-in-law sued to claim 110,000 yuan in child-care fees for raising her grandchild. Is there any legal basis for this?
The court of Shuimogou District in Urumqi, Xinjiang, recently accepted the region's first "grandchild-care fee" dispute. A mother sued her son, demanding 110,000 yuan for three years of caring for her grandchild. The court ultimately dismissed the mother's claim.
Case: Doing laundry, cooking, and taking care of her grandson—this has been the life of Li Meilan, an elderly woman in Urumqi, for the past three years. In early 2010, Li Meilan’s grandson was born, after which she moved into her son’s home to help care for the child and do housework free of charge. Unexpectedly, in early this year, due to marital discord, Li Meilan’s son and daughter-in-law divorced, and the court awarded custody of the child to the daughter-in-law.
Heartbroken, Li Meilan sued her son and daughter-in-law at the Shuimogou District Court in Urumqi, demanding payment of 11 yuan for 46 months of labor from the birth of her grandson to January of this year. In court, Li Meilan stated: during more than three years of living together, she basically took on the housework, and after the grandson was born, she served as both caregiver and nanny. She could not have given her efforts for nothing, and was now seeking compensation for more than three years of labor. Li Meilan's former daughter-in-law responded that when the child was born, she had proposed hiring a nanny, but her mother-in-law said she was willing to care for the grandson, and that the child's growth had brought her much joy.
After trial, the court ruled to dismiss Li Meilan's lawsuit.
(Sina)
Is "grandparenting compensation" a legal obligation or a moral expectation?
According to Article 36 of China’s Marriage Law, “The relationship between parents and children shall not be eliminated by the divorce of the parents. After divorce, regardless of whether the father or mother has direct custody, the children remain the children of both parents.” The elderly have no legal obligation to support their grandchildren. At the same time, the judge in this case also explained: In this case, the elderly person cared for the child based on traditional customs and blood ties. During this period, the child’s parents also fulfilled their obligation to raise the child. Therefore, the elderly person’s act of looking after the child was not an act of support, but a moral act, which is insufficient to produce civil legal consequences. Moreover, the elderly person had no prior agreement with the son and Lin Fei regarding payment of labor remuneration for caring for the child, nor did they provide evidence to prove the expenses incurred during the period of caring for the child. Therefore, the court did not support their litigation request. It can thus be seen that the court’s rejection of the elderly person’s claim for “grandchild-raising fees” has a certain legal basis.
Coincidentally, a few years ago, an elderly couple in Le'an County raised their grandchildren for 15 years but received no gratitude or repayment from their son and daughter-in-law. In a fit of anger, they sued their son and daughter-in-law in court, demanding payment of "grandchild care fees." However, the court held that parents are the legal guardians of minor children, and raising and educating their children is their statutory duty. As grandparents, they have no obligation to raise the children, and their assistance in raising the children for their son and daughter-in-law created a debt of negotiorum gestio. Ultimately, based on local conditions, the court ruled that the couple, Da Chen and his wife, pay a total of 34,590 yuan in child support for the two children.
In fact, if elderly people help raise grandchildren or maternal grandchildren and wish to maintain a good family relationship, they should not treat money as a condition for childcare, turning family bonds into a naked monetary relationship. From a moral perspective, regardless of whether parents take care of the children, they should give money to the elderly. If it must be elevated to a legal perspective, parents only have the obligation to raise their children, not their grandchildren. However, elderly people helping to raise grandchildren is a Chinese tradition and a moral issue. Simply put, elderly people assisting in raising and educating the next generation should be seen as a matter of human sentiment, not an obligation. Yet, due to traditional concepts in our country, few parents claim expenses from their children, so the law has not clearly set standards for this.
Although the law does not explicitly stipulate that grandparents have an obligation to raise their grandchildren, when grandparents voluntarily take on this responsibility out of love and reason, and go to court to claim "grandchild-rearing expenses," it is not truly about the money but about their love for their grandchildren. Therefore, the author believes that while grandparents may lose their case in court when claiming "grandchild-care fees," they have not lost in terms of what is right. Moreover, most grandparents who seek "grandchild-care fees" have immature children. Children themselves have the obligation to support their parents, and most parents will not fail to love their own children and grandchildren. "Grandchild-rearing expenses" may be a signal: new fathers and mothers, in the face of increasingly high living costs, are you truly prepared to raise children?
