A FATHER has been told his child support payments are to increase by a staggering 550 per cent.

Paul Townley from Bolton currently pays £51.05 each month to his ex-wife towards the keep of two children from his first marriage.

But a re-assessment of his contributions by the Child Support Agency (CSA) has resulted in him being ordered to now pay £331.37 a month.

The 35-year-old, who has re-married and has two more children, aged four and two, says paying the extra £280.32 will financially cripple him.

He is angry that the CSA refuse to lower the payments which were increased after the agency took into account his rise in wages over the past three years.

Mr Townley was last assessed in 1999 when he was earning £14,000-a-year as a parts marketing manager for a car dealership in Wigan.

Since then he has switched jobs and now earns £25,500 as a parts representative in the motoring industry.

The 82.4 per cent rise in his salary, however, is still dwarfed by the 550 per cent increase in his child support payments.

Mr Townley now said his family had just two options: for him to quit his job and claim benefits or his wife to go to work and put the children into a nursery during the day.

He said: "My wife and children are being penalised for my past life.

"The end result of all this is that my family will suffer.

"My wife and I have not slept since we heard the payments were to be increased."

Since his divorce from his ex-wife five years ago, Mr Townley has been supporting their two children, aged 11 and 10.

He said: "I just get the feeling that I'm paying the cost of all those absent fathers out there."

"That is what the CSA was originally set up for but it seems to prey on the easy touches like myself.

"It angers me that I am more than willing to pay maintenance for my children from a previous marriage but I am being ordered to pay a sum that is not within reason.

"It's ironic that by supporting my first two children, I will be unable to properly support my other two.

"I'm trying to do my very best but this has knocked me for six."

A CSA spokesman said they do not comment on individual cases.