Asked by: Danny Chambers (Liberal Democrat - Winchester)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to reduce waiting times and improve contact accessibility for Child Maintenance Service users in Winchester constituency.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service (CMS) is committed to improving accessibility and customer experience for all users, including those in the Winchester constituency. The Department recognises that call waiting times and contact routes have not always met expected standards and has taken steps to address this.
CMS has implemented the Digital Assist Telephony Service to support customers to use online services and reduce avoidable call demand.
CMS has invested in enhanced telephony routing to prioritise vulnerable customers and direct callers to the right support quickly, with additional operational capacity deployed when required to maintain service levels. CMS has extended weekday telephony hours to 6pm to meet demand.
CMS has expanded digital self-service, including Get Help Arranging Child Maintenance (GHACM) and My Child Maintenance Case (online account), which provide 24/7 access for parents to manage their case without needing to call, improving accessibility and offering greater flexibility on how and when customers make contact. Communication has been further improved through the introduction of online messaging for specific processes, with further expansion planned.
By promoting self-service options online and efficient call routing, we have freed up valuable resources to deliver a more responsive service and allow caseworkers more time to better assist customers who need to reach out to us via telephone. These measures are delivering progresses.
The Department will continue to monitor performance and invest in further improvements to ensure customers receive timely, high-quality support through the channels that best meet their needs and remains committed to providing a reliable, fair and responsive service for all parents across the country.
Asked by: Danny Chambers (Liberal Democrat - Winchester)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps she is taking to support victims of economic abuse when applying for monies that they are entitled to through the Child Maintenance Service.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service (CMS) takes the issue of domestic abuse extremely seriously and recognises that domestic abuse can take many forms including physical, emotional, or financial abuse, violent or threatening behaviour and coercive control.
The CMS has procedures in place to ensure victims and survivors of domestic abuse can use its services safely. CMS caseworkers will also signpost, where needed, to suitable domestic abuse organisations, if domestic abuse is raised or suspected.
All CMS caseworkers have extensive training, equipping them to be able to comprehensively act on a range of scenarios. For our most challenging and complex case groups, caseworkers complete and receive regular refresher training on specific aspects of customer service situations such as domestic abuse, advanced customer support and supporting vulnerable customers.
Specialist Case Team is one of the measures CMS have introduced to manage cases with the most challenging or complex domestic abuse concerns. This has minimised the need for parents to recount their history of domestic abuse and caseworkers to deliver support to some of the most vulnerable customers.
For parents using the Direct Pay service, the CMS can act as an intermediary to facilitate the exchange of bank details to help ensure there is no unwanted contact between parents and can provide information on how to set up bank accounts with a centralised sort code, which reduces the risk of a parent’s location being traced.
The Government has announced plans to reform the Child Maintenance service, replacing the existing Direct Pay Service and moving to a service where the CMS collects and transfers all payments. This will remove any requirement for victims and survivors to provide evidence of domestic abuse, which we know can be difficult and traumatising. It will also remove any need for contact between parents and remove the need for receiving parents to report missed or late payments. The CMS will monitor all payments and take swift action as soon as payments break down.
Managing all CMS cases in one service will allow the CMS to tackle non-compliance faster, and better support victims and survivors of domestic abuse who use the CMS.
Asked by: Danny Chambers (Liberal Democrat - Winchester)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of removing the two-child benefit cap.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We cannot currently commit to ending the two-child limit. However, tackling child poverty, as the last Labour Government did, is at the heart of this Government’s missions. The Child Poverty Taskforce is exploring all available levers, including social security reform.