Sponsored husband not ready to work OR pay child support

[jcurtsy]

I am a struggling mother (of two babies including a 1.5 month old newborn baby) who currently doesn't know how to pay my bills, with the limited maternity EI that I am getting.

I (Canadian citizen) got married in India and then filed for PR for my husband. Obviously, as part of that application, I signed the document stating that I will pay for all his expenses for 3 years from the date of his landing in Canada. After landing in Canada, he is not willing to work or support me. He just want to stay at my home and enjoy!

I have talked with him numerous times, right from the first month he landed here, about how important it is for both of us to work. But I am hopeless now. We are still living together and I want him to contribute something to this relationship. So far he has given me zero dollar! Me and my family has donated quite a lot of money to him and his family at different occasions.

The timeline of our relationship and my property acquirement is below.
------
Jan 2018: I purchased my house (condo) in Alberta. (I did not even know my husband at this time)
Feb 2020: I got married in India.
June 2020: I filed for my husband's PR to bring him to Canada.
March 2021: I got pregnant during my vacation in India.
Oct 2021: My husband landed in Alberta and started living with me in my house. My "3 year-sponsorship" begins (for my husband's expenses).
Nov 2021: Our first child's birth.
Dec 2022: Our second child's birth.
Feb 2023: All four of us are still living together in my house; all expenses of all four of us are taken care of by me.
.
Oct 2024: End of my "3 year-sponsorship" (for my husband's expenses, which started in Oct 2021)
-----
1) Is my husband required by law to pay for children even though he is under my sponsorship? OR all of these (a family of four) are now my responsibility? Note: I did not have children (and I was NOT pregnant) at the time of signing the sponsorship document of my husband. Both my kids are born in Canada.
2) Can I ask my husband to leave my house? I heard you cannot ask to leave the marital home??
3) How can I get him to pay atleast some money ? I am currently finding it difficult to pay for the whole family which is why I am looking for the legal requirement.
(If I had good income, I wouldn't have cared whether he pays or not)

I want to know, if we are separated, what would be our financial liabilities to each other as per law. (my annual income is less than $40,000). I know I am bound to pay his expenses until Oct 2024, even if we are separated/divorced. But is he not required to pay child support? which means the money that I have to pay will be cancelled by the money that he has to pay me for child support, right? During his 1.5 years of stay in Canada, my husband has only worked for about 16 days in a nearby store. All his expenses are being taken care of by me.

 

[scylla]

I am a struggling mother (of two babies including a 1.5 month old newborn baby) who currently doesn't know how to pay my bills, with the limited maternity EI that I am getting.

I (Canadian citizen) got married in India and then filed for PR for my husband. Obviously, as part of that application, I signed the document stating that I will pay for all his expenses for 3 years from the date of his landing in Canada. After landing in Canada, he is not willing to work or support me. He just want to stay at my home and enjoy!

I have talked with him numerous times, right from the first month he landed here, about how important it is for both of us to work. But I am hopeless now. We are still living together and I want him to contribute something to this relationship. So far he has given me zero dollar! Me and my family has donated quite a lot of money to him and his family at different occasions.

The timeline of our relationship and my property acquirement is below.
------
Jan 2018: I purchased my house (condo) in Alberta. (I did not even know my husband at this time)
Feb 2020: I got married in India.
June 2020: I filed for my husband's PR to bring him to Canada.
March 2021: I got pregnant during my vacation in India.
Oct 2021: My husband landed in Alberta and started living with me in my house. My "3 year-sponsorship" begins (for my husband's expenses).
Nov 2021: Our first child's birth.
Dec 2022: Our second child's birth.
Feb 2023: All four of us are still living together in my house; all expenses of all four of us are taken care of by me.
.
Oct 2024: End of my "3 year-sponsorship" (for my husband's expenses, which started in Oct 2021)
-----
1) Is my husband required by law to pay for children even though he is under my sponsorship? OR all of these (a family of four) are now my responsibility? Note: I did not have children (and I was NOT pregnant) at the time of signing the sponsorship document of my husband. Both my kids are born in Canada.
2) Can I ask my husband to leave my house? I heard you cannot ask to leave the marital home??
3) How can I get him to pay atleast some money ? I am currently finding it difficult to pay for the whole family which is why I am looking for the legal requirement.
(If I had good income, I wouldn't have cared whether he pays or not)

I want to know, if we are separated, what would be our financial liabilities to each other as per law. (my annual income is less than $40,000). I know I am bound to pay his expenses until Oct 2024, even if we are separated/divorced. But is he not required to pay child support? which means the money that I have to pay will be cancelled by the money that he has to pay me for child support, right? During his 1.5 years of stay in Canada, my husband has only worked for about 16 days in a nearby store. All his expenses are being taken care of by me.

You need to get a consult with a family lawyer. These are not immigration questions but family law questions.

The only immigration aspect about this is the fact that you are responsible for him financially for another 1.5 years. This means that if he goes on social assistance during this time, you will have to repay this money back to the government. The rest of the questions are family law.

Sorry for your situation and get yourself a good family lawyer.

 

[Ponga]

I am a struggling mother (of two babies including a 1.5 month old newborn baby) who currently doesn't know how to pay my bills, with the limited maternity EI that I am getting.

I (Canadian citizen) got married in India and then filed for PR for my husband. Obviously, as part of that application, I signed the document stating that I will pay for all his expenses for 3 years from the date of his landing in Canada. After landing in Canada, he is not willing to work or support me. He just want to stay at my home and enjoy!

I have talked with him numerous times, right from the first month he landed here, about how important it is for both of us to work. But I am hopeless now. We are still living together and I want him to contribute something to this relationship. So far he has given me zero dollar! Me and my family has donated quite a lot of money to him and his family at different occasions.

The timeline of our relationship and my property acquirement is below.
------
Jan 2018: I purchased my house (condo) in Alberta. (I did not even know my husband at this time)
Feb 2020: I got married in India.
June 2020: I filed for my husband's PR to bring him to Canada.
March 2021: I got pregnant during my vacation in India.
Oct 2021: My husband landed in Alberta and started living with me in my house. My "3 year-sponsorship" begins (for my husband's expenses).
Nov 2021: Our first child's birth.
Dec 2022: Our second child's birth.
Feb 2023: All four of us are still living together in my house; all expenses of all four of us are taken care of by me.
.
Oct 2024: End of my "3 year-sponsorship" (for my husband's expenses, which started in Oct 2021)
-----
1) Is my husband required by law to pay for children even though he is under my sponsorship? OR all of these (a family of four) are now my responsibility? Note: I did not have children (and I was NOT pregnant) at the time of signing the sponsorship document of my husband. Both my kids are born in Canada.
2) Can I ask my husband to leave my house? I heard you cannot ask to leave the marital home??
3) How can I get him to pay atleast some money ? I am currently finding it difficult to pay for the whole family which is why I am looking for the legal requirement.
(If I had good income, I wouldn't have cared whether he pays or not)

I want to know, if we are separated, what would be our financial liabilities to each other as per law. (my annual income is less than $40,000). I know I am bound to pay his expenses until Oct 2024, even if we are separated/divorced. But is he not required to pay child support? which means the money that I have to pay will be cancelled by the money that he has to pay me for child support, right? During his 1.5 years of stay in Canada, my husband has only worked for about 16 days in a nearby store. All his expenses are being taken care of by me.

So sorry to hear your story.

Firstly, you should probably be asking someone familiar with family law in your province (AB?) about any support questions. Since you are still `together', there may not be anything to enforce, unfortunately. I hope that I'm mistaken, because you deserve MORE than you are getting.

1. See above

2. Why not? The Condition:51 that was in place previously, that did require a sponsored spouse to cohabit with their sponsor for 2 years, was repealed a few years ago. I suspect that you can `toss him out', but...because you are financially responsible for him for another ~ 20 months or so, your financial situation will become vastly worse; you'd be paying for two homes! Even if he were to suddenly begin to pay some sort of child support, you would still be losing because you would be paying for the roof over his head.

3. Hold a mirror in front of him and ask "Do you see what I see"?
Respectfully, is this due, in part, to his culture? The few men that I know from India are very hard workers and certainly do not seem to align with your husband's behavior.

When you ask him why he is not contributing, financially, to his family...what does he say? Anything?

I hate to say it, but...unless/until you can talk with someone other than those of us on a Canadian immigration forum, you may not get much in the way of solid options. If you do separate, there would likely be spousal support, as well as child support that would be due, but how do you `get blood from a turnip '?
It's a deplorable situation and I wish you the best in finding the solution that you and your children deserve!

 

[steaky]

I am a struggling mother (of two babies including a 1.5 month old newborn baby) who currently doesn't know how to pay my bills, with the limited maternity EI that I am getting.

I (Canadian citizen) got married in India and then filed for PR for my husband. Obviously, as part of that application, I signed the document stating that I will pay for all his expenses for 3 years from the date of his landing in Canada. After landing in Canada, he is not willing to work or support me. He just want to stay at my home and enjoy!

I have talked with him numerous times, right from the first month he landed here, about how important it is for both of us to work. But I am hopeless now. We are still living together and I want him to contribute something to this relationship. So far he has given me zero dollar! Me and my family has donated quite a lot of money to him and his family at different occasions.

The timeline of our relationship and my property acquirement is below.
------
Jan 2018: I purchased my house (condo) in Alberta. (I did not even know my husband at this time)
Feb 2020: I got married in India.
June 2020: I filed for my husband's PR to bring him to Canada.
March 2021: I got pregnant during my vacation in India.
Oct 2021: My husband landed in Alberta and started living with me in my house. My "3 year-sponsorship" begins (for my husband's expenses).
Nov 2021: Our first child's birth.
Dec 2022: Our second child's birth.
Feb 2023: All four of us are still living together in my house; all expenses of all four of us are taken care of by me.
.
Oct 2024: End of my "3 year-sponsorship" (for my husband's expenses, which started in Oct 2021)
-----
1) Is my husband required by law to pay for children even though he is under my sponsorship? OR all of these (a family of four) are now my responsibility? Note: I did not have children (and I was NOT pregnant) at the time of signing the sponsorship document of my husband. Both my kids are born in Canada.
2) Can I ask my husband to leave my house? I heard you cannot ask to leave the marital home??
3) How can I get him to pay atleast some money ? I am currently finding it difficult to pay for the whole family which is why I am looking for the legal requirement.
(If I had good income, I wouldn't have cared whether he pays or not)

I want to know, if we are separated, what would be our financial liabilities to each other as per law. (my annual income is less than $40,000). I know I am bound to pay his expenses until Oct 2024, even if we are separated/divorced. But is he not required to pay child support? which means the money that I have to pay will be cancelled by the money that he has to pay me for child support, right? During his 1.5 years of stay in Canada, my husband has only worked for about 16 days in a nearby store. All his expenses are being taken care of by me.

I think it's your own fault. When you were married in India, was your husband also unemployed? Before his landing, was he also unemployed? Why didn't you tell him that he need to contribute financially at the time he asked you to marry him?

 

[scylla]

I think it's your own fault. When you were married in India, was your husband also unemployed? Before his landing, was he also unemployed? Why didn't you tell him that he need to contribute financially at the time he asked you to marry him?

Great job victim blaming.

 

[jcurtsy]

Also, if he goes to the court asking for child custody (in case of a separation), will the court give it to him. He has no job, no money! Will the court still ask that he be given custody of the children?

I am a struggling mother (of two babies including a 1.5 month old newborn baby) who currently doesn't know how to pay my bills, with the limited maternity EI that I am getting.

I (Canadian citizen) got married in India and then filed for PR for my husband. Obviously, as part of that application, I signed the document stating that I will pay for all his expenses for 3 years from the date of his landing in Canada. After landing in Canada, he is not willing to work or support me. He just want to stay at my home and enjoy!

I have talked with him numerous times, right from the first month he landed here, about how important it is for both of us to work. But I am hopeless now. We are still living together and I want him to contribute something to this relationship. So far he has given me zero dollar! Me and my family has donated quite a lot of money to him and his family at different occasions.

The timeline of our relationship and my property acquirement is below.
------
Jan 2018: I purchased my house (condo) in Alberta. (I did not even know my husband at this time)
Feb 2020: I got married in India.
June 2020: I filed for my husband's PR to bring him to Canada.
March 2021: I got pregnant during my vacation in India.
Oct 2021: My husband landed in Alberta and started living with me in my house. My "3 year-sponsorship" begins (for my husband's expenses).
Nov 2021: Our first child's birth.
Dec 2022: Our second child's birth.
Feb 2023: All four of us are still living together in my house; all expenses of all four of us are taken care of by me.
.
Oct 2024: End of my "3 year-sponsorship" (for my husband's expenses, which started in Oct 2021)
-----
1) Is my husband required by law to pay for children even though he is under my sponsorship? OR all of these (a family of four) are now my responsibility? Note: I did not have children (and I was NOT pregnant) at the time of signing the sponsorship document of my husband. Both my kids are born in Canada.
2) Can I ask my husband to leave my house? I heard you cannot ask to leave the marital home??
3) How can I get him to pay atleast some money ? I am currently finding it difficult to pay for the whole family which is why I am looking for the legal requirement.
(If I had good income, I wouldn't have cared whether he pays or not)

I want to know, if we are separated, what would be our financial liabilities to each other as per law. (my annual income is less than $40,000). I know I am bound to pay his expenses until Oct 2024, even if we are separated/divorced. But is he not required to pay child support? which means the money that I have to pay will be cancelled by the money that he has to pay me for child support, right? During his 1.5 years of stay in Canada, my husband has only worked for about 16 days in a nearby store. All his expenses are being taken care of by me.

 

[scylla]

Also, if he goes to the court asking for child custody (in case of a separation), will the court give it to him. He has no job, no money! Will the court still ask that he be given custody of the children?

All of these questions are family law questions (not immigration law questions). You really need to get advice from a family lawyer.

 

[YVR123]

Also, if he goes to the court asking for child custody (in case of a separation), will the court give it to him. He has no job, no money! Will the court still ask that he be given custody of the children?

You need to check with a family law lawyer. Anything is possible. It could be shared custody but that's part of the divorce not "separation" .
Again, I do not know the answer. It's not an immigration question.

 

[Ponga]

I think it's your own fault. When you were married in India, was your husband also unemployed? Before his landing, was he also unemployed? Why didn't you tell him that he need to contribute financially at the time he asked you to marry him?

Because she should not have had to tell him.

 

[jcurtsy]

Hi steaky,
I believe you misread my post! My question was not "whose fault it was". Please read my post once again to see all those sentences that ends up with a question mark! (especially the questions numbered 1,2,3) Those are the ones that you need to answer!

By the way, steaky, do you live in the real world? How many people (or what percentage of the population) who says "yes/I do" to different questions, keep their word after marriage?

Thankyou for your time, though!

I think it's your own fault. When you were married in India, was your husband also unemployed? Before his landing, was he also unemployed? Why didn't you tell him that he need to contribute financially at the time he asked you to marry him?

 

[Naturgrl]

Sorry you are in this situation. It must be so scary with babies. As said already, get a good family lawyer if you want to pursue separation . Attached are some resources on separation/divorce from department of justice. Also research separation and divorce rules for Alberta. Child support is based on income and if your husband doesn’t have a job then he will not be paying much if anything in child support. However, you may have to pay him as your are the primary income earner. Doesn’t seem fair does it? The table is the amount of child support for Alberta by income. As for custody, the link provides information. Usually you want to work out custody arrangements together before going to court.

https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/fl-df/index.html


https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/fl-df/child-enfant/fcsg-lfpae/2017/pdf/aba.pdf

 

[canuck78]

Also, if he goes to the court asking for child custody (in case of a separation), will the court give it to him. He has no job, no money! Will the court still ask that he be given custody of the children?

Yes he could get partial child custody and child support. You are the primary income earner in this relationship. The good part of the situation is that you haven’t been married that long but it is in your interest to file for separation as soon as possible because the amount of time you have been married factors into things like spousal support. As others have pointed out you need to speak to a family lawyer. Having a friend go through a difficult divorce where the wife was the primary breadwinner, the husband stole money from the wife and the ex refuses to work so she is paying child support and spousal support for 5 years until his spousal support ends, unfortunately these things happen and you can only control what you do not what he does. They were both Canadian citizens so not all similar issues. She also pays for their full-time nanny. The woman is making much more than 40k so her ex-husband’s support payments are high enough to survive without working. If you are making 40k, if he is awarded support payments they will not be high enough to be able to stay at home and not work. It feels extremely unfair but many rules have been set in places to protect women who were often stay at home mothers and after a divorce were left without funds and had not been in the work force for a very long period of time. Now that women are becoming the sole income earners or the primary income earners, family law tries to protect whatever partner is not the primary income earner. Unfortunately given your financial situation you may have to return to work before your maternity leave is technically over and your husband will have to look after the children while you work. You are not the only family who that has had to return to work earlier than they wanted to for financial reasons. The thought of being the primary caregiver during the day to his own children may make him seek out employment. You have had 2 children very close together so if you are not currently taking birth control I would recommend protecting yourself from a potential 3rd child.

 

[canuck78]

Sorry you are in this situation. It must be so scary with babies. As said already, get a good family lawyer if you want to pursue separation . Attached are some resources on separation/divorce from department of justice. Also research separation and divorce rules for Alberta. Child support is based on income and if your husband doesn’t have a job then he will not be paying much if anything in child support. The table is the amount of child support for Alberta by income. As for custody,, the link provides information. Usually you want to work out custody arrangements together before going to court.

https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/fl-df/index.html


https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/fl-df/child-enfant/fcsg-lfpae/2017/pdf/aba.pdf

The reality is that as the sole income earner this wife is more likely to have to pay child support to the husband in this case if the husband wants some custody of the children. This is a good warning for others; if you have a spouse who is not working or contributing in other ways like being the full-time caregiver for the children don’t expect them to suddenly change. They have shown you who they are and it is up to you to decide whether to listen to them. In cases like this you can control what you do and can’t control the other person. Getting on birth control to prevent more children if the relationship is not working, working to provide income your family if your partner is not working, initiating the separation if the relationship is not working out, etc. Unfortunately some people will never feel the responsibility to go out and work hard to try and support their family, help in the home to raise the children and do domestic chores especially when both spouses are working, etc. In some situations you just have to move on even though you may face a few years of hardships because there is no way you can force someone to change unless they want to change.

 

[canuck78]

Although this is not a family law forum, I can't count the number of times I have seen non-immigration issues raised and considered here. Many are incidental to immigration issues, such as I see here: How does the financial liability of a sponsoring spouse fit in with inter-spousal liability for children & c.

It's so very easy to tell someone to go retain a family law lawyer, or lawyer of some other speciality as the circumstances require. But how practical is that? Here, we are told of a wife earning under $40k, a lazy husband, and 2 infants to manage. Can she come up with a minimum of $250 an hour to retain counsel, who will likely ask for at least $2k up front as a retainer? I think we all know the answer.

If a lawyer is to come to the rescue, it will have to be somehow at little or no cost to the OP. I do not know what resources might be available in Alberta. In my home province of BC, Legal Aid provides little funding for family law cases. However, the feds provide some funding to all provinces for what are e broadly described as "Family Justice Services". Some info is here:

https://justice.gc.ca/eng/fl-df/fjs-sjf/bfjs-sjfb/fjs-sjf.html

If there are any Albertans here with Alberta-specific knowledge, pls. share what you know, relevant to the OP. In BC, we have Family Justice Counsellors, but their role tends to be limited to assisting those already involved in court processes. There may be a number of sources of which I am unaware. Here in BC, I was involved for a few years or so with LSLAP - the UBC Law Students Legal Advice Program. When I was involved, we gave advice in almost all areas of the law, under a lawyer’s supervision. Some very good work was done. I believe LSLAP is still in operation, but the name may have changed. There might be something similar offered by the law schools at Edmonton or Calgary. There might be many pro bono (or nearly so) services of which I am unaware.

There has been some mention in this thread of the husband gaining child custody. There’s about zero chance of that. But, he would almost certainly be entitled to “access” under the law. That’s likely to be something like a few hours at a time, 2 or 3 days a week. The children are very young and maybe being breastfed, and courts take that into account in deciding access issues.

As for booting the husband out of the house, sure you can ask. Not likely he’ll go voluntarily however. But, a first step would be to announce your decision to separate from him, then ask him to leave. Of course, asking him to leave might trigger liability under your 3-year promise to keep him off the public tit. So, there is that potential unintended consequence to contemplate.

Supposing you muster the courage to tell him to hit the road and he declines the invitation to leave (because he has it pretty good where he is), what next? Because you have title to the family home won’t help a lot. Calling the cops to remove him won’t work. They’ll say it’s a civil matter, not criminal. They will remove him if there has been violence. Then you have to look at things like a restraining order, a peace bond, etc.

If he plays his cards right and comes across as calm and peaceful, the only way to get him out is to apply to the court for an order for exclusive possession of the home. There’s all kinds of law on that, a bit beyond this writing.

Returning to your specific questions:

Liability for child support and sponsorship obligations are unrelated. All parents have an obligation to support their children. It's not an obligation that can be bargained away. Support is the right of the child. Of course, that sounds great, but the reality is that the man is a bum (taking your words as true) and no law or court can make him less of a bum. The old idea of getting blood from a stone comes to mind. But, you might get some tough judge who will say something along the lines of he should be able to earn at least minimum wage and the court will impute that income to him and order him to pay the "table amount" of support accordingly. @Naturgrl has kindly directed you to the tables, I believe.

Now, we know he won't run out and get a job and pay anything. So, more stern measures will have to be brought to bear. In BC, the FMEP can become involved. He can have his driver's licence suspended. As I mentioned, you might have a hardass judge on your side who, if the deadbeat does not get a job and pay up, will find him in contempt of the order to pay. Then, he will likely be given some time in which to "purge" his contempt by paying, failing which he'll be imprisoned for a short time. All good clean fun when contempt proceedings are invoked.

Here's a BC contempt case example:

Prentice v. Prentice S.C., Meiklem J., 2012 BCSC 676, Vernon 45980, May 11, 2012 , 18pp.
https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/SC/12/06/2012BCSC0676.htm

Here's another, for good measure:

T. (T.) v. G. (C.) S.C., Jenkins J., 2014 BCSC 1279, Vancouver E101746, July 11, 2014 , 12pp.
https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/SC/14/12/2014BCSC1279cor1.htm



Covered, above.



As a practical matter, you can't. Although, some of the machinations to which I have referred, might, in time, yield some result.


This has been covered to some extent. As for the notion "But is he not required to pay child support? which means the money that I have to pay will be cancelled by the money that he has to pay me for child support, right?" Sorry, but dead wrong. You are conflating his obligation to pay child support, with you performing your promise and contract with Canada. The two are wholly unrelated. If your husband goes on the dole and Canada comes after you for reimbursement, it will avail you not at all to cry "Yes, but he owes me child support." When it comes to enforcing your undertaking to the Crown, Canada could not care less about the state of accounts as between spouses. You have no right of setoff to assert against the Crown, and that’s the way it should be.

I have set out the foregoing knowing very little about you and your husband, only what you have written. It would be interesting to know what is this man's age, education, work experience, English facility, etc. It would also be interesting to know what has transpired in all the time you have been together, including the decision to have a second child. Was there never any discussion about him becoming productive?

Child custody can mean partial custody it doesn’t have to mean full custody. If you are not working and have a few days with the children you can still be awarded support payments and/or child support. By the time it comes to divorce the children may likely be old enough to remain overnight with the father if he wants to have days of custody not just a few hours. Pumping or formula are both options these days that I have seen separated parents use especially once the child is no longer solely breastfed. You assume that the judge will be hard on the father but he could equally take the husband’s side and say that given he has recently immigrated he may have had difficulty finding a job. As you mention we have no idea what skills, education, language skills or previous work history this individual has. You can go ahead with a separation and still have to share a space. The longer they delay a separation and then a divorce the longer the marriage which will factor into potential support payments and establishing the wife as the primary income earner supporting the family. There is also the immediate issue of not being able to afford to support themselves on maternity EI. Unfortunately I don’t think that the father is going to suddenly start working so this mother will likely have to look at returning to work. Telling the husband that they will have to be the sole caregiver so the wife can go back to work because they can’t live on her EI may actually make him go to work. Staying at home with 2 young kids will be much harder work than most jobs.

 

[jcurtsy]

Ponga, Thankyou for taking time to reply and giving some important information.
To answer your questions,
3) This has nothing to do with culture. In fact, both the culture in India and the law in India requires him to pay for me and the kids (even if I were to separate from him) where as I can be staying at home even after the kids are grown up. I wish he has followed the culture! This is his personal laziness and nothing else.

He is very good at talking (far better than me)! So whenever we had a financial-related discussion, he would either easily divert the topic or give me 'n' no.of excuses about why he could not drop a resume in a store.

Thankyou.

So sorry to hear your story.

Firstly, you should probably be asking someone familiar with family law in your province (AB?) about any support questions. Since you are still `together', there may not be anything to enforce, unfortunately. I hope that I'm mistaken, because you deserve MORE than you are getting.

1. See above

2. Why not? The Condition:51 that was in place previously, that did require a sponsored spouse to cohabit with their sponsor for 2 years, was repealed a few years ago. I suspect that you can `toss him out', but...because you are financially responsible for him for another ~ 20 months or so, your financial situation will become vastly worse; you'd be paying for two homes! Even if he were to suddenly begin to pay some sort of child support, you would still be losing because you would be paying for the roof over his head.

3. Hold a mirror in front of him and ask "Do you see what I see"?
Respectfully, is this due, in part, to his culture? The few men that I know from India are very hard workers and certainly do not seem to align with your husband's behavior.

When you ask him why he is not contributing, financially, to his family...what does he say? Anything?

I hate to say it, but...unless/until you can talk with someone other than those of us on a Canadian immigration forum, you may not get much in the way of solid options. If you do separate, there would likely be spousal support, as well as child support that would be due, but how do you `get blood from a turnip '?
It's a deplorable situation and I wish you the best in finding the solution that you and your children deserve!