Section 5

Where an application is made to a Magistrate’s Court or District Court for a maintenance order against any person, and it is proved that that person is resident in England or Northern Ireland, the court may, in the absence of that person, if after hearing the evidence it is satisfied of the justice of the application, make any such order as it might have made if a summons had been duly served on that person and he had failed to appear at the hearing, but in such case the order shall be provisional only, and shall have no effect unless confirmed by a competent court in England or Northern Ireland.

The evidence of any witness who is examined on any such application shall be put into writing, and the deposition shall be read over to and signed by him.

Where such an order is made, the court shall send to the Minister for transmission to a Secretary of State the depositions so taken and a certified copy of the order, together with a statement of the grounds on which the making of the order might have been opposed if the person against whom the order is made had been duly served with a summons and had appeared at the hearing, and such information as the court possesses for facilitating the identification of that person, and ascertaining his whereabouts.

Where any such provisional order has come before a competent court in England or Northern Ireland for confirmation, and the order has by that court been remitted to the Magistrate’s Court or District Court which made the order for the purpose of taking further evidence, the Magistrate’s Court or District Court shall, after giving the prescribed notice, proceed to take the evidence in like manner and subject to the like conditions as the evidence in support of the original application. If upon the hearing of such evidence it appears to the court that the order ought not to have been made, the court may rescind the order, but in any other case the depositions shall be sent to the Minister and dealt with in like manner as the original depositions.

The confirmation of an order made under this section shall not affect any power of a Magistrate’s Court or District Court to vary or rescind that order:Provided that on the making of a varying or rescinding order the court shall send a certified copy thereof to the Minister for transmission to a Secretary of State and that in the case of an order varying the original order the order shall not have any effect unless confirmed in like manner as the original order.

The applicant shall have the same right of appeal, if any, against a refusal to make a provisional order as he would have had against a refusal to make the order had a summons been duly served on the person against whom the order is sought to be made.