Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Helen Morgan and Paul Maynard

Monday 5th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)]

3. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the Child Maintenance Service in collecting child maintenance payments.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Paul Maynard)]

The Government are dedicated to ensuring that parents meet their obligations to children, and we take robust enforcement action against those who do not. Parents who paid some maintenance on the collect and pay service increased from 64% to 69% over the 12 months from September 2022.

[Helen Morgan]

My constituent’s daughter is a young lady who has missed out for more than a year on child maintenance payments, because her father changed jobs and the Child Maintenance Service lost track of him. My team have been involved, and despite lots of faffing, she still has not received a payment. She is one of around half of children in separated families who are not receiving the maintenance payments they deserve. Will the Minister explain what his Department is doing to ensure that the employers of these missing parents are properly chased up?

[Paul Maynard]

Where parents have certain categories of taxable income not being captured by the standard child maintenance calculation, they can make a request to the CMS to have the calculation varied. We have consulted on proposals to include more types of taxable income held by His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs in the standard maintenance calculation.