Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005 section 51

Supplementary provisions

Section 51 defines key terms used in the maternity benefit provisions and clarifies how courts should treat maternity benefit when making maintenance orders.

• "Confinement" means labour resulting in a living child, or in any child (alive or dead) after 24 weeks of pregnancy, or in a child weighing at least 500 grammes at birth.
• The "premature birth period" runs from the actual date of confinement (for births on or after 1 October 2017) until two weeks before the expected week of confinement.
• When labour spans two calendar days or involves multiple births, the date of confinement is the date on which the child (or last child) is actually born.
• Courts deciding maintenance orders for birth-related expenses must not take into account whether the mother is entitled to maternity benefit.