Child Maintenance Arrears

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Tuesday 17th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Dr Mullan]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that issue. My focus today is on the need to change regulations, but I accept the wider concern about the functioning and efficiency of the agency. I will go on to talk about his point about the cost of living crisis. Figures suggest that 16% of children who are not in receipt of maintenance payments would be lifted out of poverty if they were, and that shows the level of concern we are trying to address.

We have seen some improvements. The NAO found that the internal processes for moving towards enforcing compliance were better, but the bigger picture is not positive. Of separated families who have a Government-mediated arrangement in place, the NAO found that only one in three see it paid in full, so two in three are not getting the payments in full to which they are entitled. Sometimes, the sums people are expected to pay are incredibly small. At the end of September 2021, total cumulative arrears under the current child maintenance scheme were £436 million. That amount is increasing at roughly £1 million a week, and the total will hit £1 billion by 2031. That is a huge amount of money that is not being paid by non-residential parents, and we have a responsibility to hold to account and punish individuals who behave in this deplorable manner.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is the children who suffer most? The way that the Child Maintenance Service is writing off arrears means that these children will be permanently disadvantaged, with no more holidays and no more of the things that most children would take for granted.

[Dr Mullan]

The hon. Member pre-empts the exact point I was going to go on to make, which is that between December 2018 and March 2021, the predecessor agency wrote off about £2.6 billion of owed maintenance. That is the Government stepping in and legally excusing a parent of their responsibilities to their child. Whether or not it is realistic to recover it, morally I am not sure the Government should be doing that in a child and parent relationship. That is not a success in my book.

As of September 2021, 38,000 paying parents with an ongoing arrangement had not paid any maintenance for more than three months, and 22,000 had not paid for more than six months. That is tens of thousands of individuals happy to let other people pick up their most fundamental responsibility of providing for their child. All too often, it is strangers picking up the pieces through the tax system. In theory, the Department has some tough powers, including imprisonment, but the figures I have quoted clearly show that they are not working. Imprisoning someone, although perhaps morally warranted, stops them being able to earn and is not a practical solution to use at the scale needed to tackle the tens of thousands of non-payers. Those delinquent individuals have learned that if they just start paying a bit again, the whole system resets.

The Department’s civil enforcements are restricted to the collection of arrears at the time when a liability order is granted and cannot be used to enforce ongoing maintenance, which is another reason why an element of punishment would serve a wider purpose. It is not surprising that the evidence shows that overall, maintenance arrears continue to build up, even when the Department begins enforcement action. The NAO found that on average, parents had arrears of £2,200 before the enforcement action began and £2,600 afterwards. As if it were not bad enough that taxpayers have to top up the income of less well-off families when one parent is not contributing, we have to put time, money and effort into chasing up payments with no consequences for those who are not paying.

Taking stronger steps is broadly supported. According to a survey by Mumsnet and Gingerbread, 93% of parents believe that those who regularly avoid paying child maintenance should face more serious penalties. Not only would punishment be morally warranted, but I expect that it would have a powerful effect on compliance and put people off not paying in the first place. As I said, tougher restrictions to ensure that people are paying their child maintenance could lift 60% of children not in receipt of payments out of poverty. With the cost of living crisis, there is no better time to tackle the issue.

A change needs to be made to the system to ensure that the continuous rise in non-payments is tackled, and that is where home curfew can play a role. When the Government originally introduced enforcement measures, they crafted the legal framework to introduce home curfew measures but the powers were never enacted. I am not clear why, but I have campaigned for some time for those powers to be put to use, so I was delighted that, earlier this year, the Secretary of State announced plans to do exactly that. I hope that today’s debate helps to encourage the Government to make progress towards that commitment.

I would welcome the opportunity for my constituents to contribute to a consultation; perhaps the Minister could meet me and some of them as plans are developed. It will be no surprise to him that I think it is important that we use this power not just as a mechanism to encourage payments but to punish. If we could meet ahead of the consultation so that we can ensure that that is part of the proposals, it would be appreciated.

Home curfew could remain in place for the designated period regardless of whether a parent started to pay—for example, for three months. I imagine that spending three months at home every night, pondering their responsibilities, would be a powerful reality check. People need to understand that we as a society do not find non-payment acceptable and that they will be punished for not paying for the upkeep of their children.

On a related note, not earning any money should be accepted as an excuse for not paying maintenance only when there has been a genuine attempt to find work, which should be determined in the same way that the Department assesses that as part of the wider work of the welfare state. If someone has responsibility for children, they should be out there doing everything they can to find a job. If they are not doing that, they should not be out socialising of an evening.

Importantly, unlike imprisonment, home curfew can be used in a way that does not prevent a person from looking for a job and earning, as it can be tailored to their circumstances. It would typically be an evening and overnight curfew to allow people to find and take work during the day, but it could be switched around for people who find night work.

I sound a note of caution. As constituency MPs, we have all had cases of people for whom the administration of maintenance by CMS has gone wrong. Of course, if we are seeking powers to restrict someone’s liberty, we need to ensure that the cases are watertight, but we know that tens of thousands of people are not paying and would be fair targets of this policy.

I understand that home detention equipment is available, so we can make the change work. I would welcome people who are not paying having to explain why they have an ankle tag and cannot go to the pub in the evening. I have no doubt that many would say that they are guilty of a minor crime before admitting that they do not pay for their own kids, which tells us all we need to know about how badly we have got it wrong.

I acknowledge that there are many loving parents who would and do contribute to the care of their children but who are prevented from seeing them by the parent who has primary custody. When I first raised the issue of home detention for non-payers, many such parents contacted me and were clearly distressed. I make it clear that I am in no way minimising that and I fully support every parent in exercising their clear legal right to secure access to their children. Of course, it is abhorrent for any parent not to act in good faith when it comes to access, but two wrongs do not make a right and, as with every MP, I have to choose what I campaign on.

I am clear that every child deserves parents who step up and look after them and that no taxpayer should be left filling the void when they do not. On behalf of a society that I believe wants to see tougher action, the Government need to proceed at speed to secure it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Guy Opperman]

The hon. Gentleman has forestalled one of the issues that I was going to raise. I remember the debate secured by the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw on 21 January 2021, in which there was discussion of how the CMS was managing during covid. It was a struggle, to be perfectly blunt; all such services were struggling to provide assistance during the pandemic, and there were complications. I would like to think that all colleagues accept that the Child Maintenance Service has improved as covid has disappeared, as people have been able to return to work, and as consistency has returned because people are no longer getting ill, having to shield and having all the problems that follow.

The hon. Member for Strangford raised the issue of numbers. There are approximately 4,000 staff working for the Child Maintenance Service in the United Kingdom. That is a lot of people who are addressing this problem on an ongoing basis. I take the criticism, and the constructive criticism, about consistency in dealing with a case. In every MP’s office up and down the country—whether on this issue, on passports, on the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency or on any public services—there are desires and hopes for consistency, so that people can build up a relationship with a particular individual. Clearly individuals working in the public sector are free to move on to other things, but the criticism is legitimately made, and I take it on board; I am certain that the noble Baroness does, too.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich talked about collections in his outstanding speech. Collections are increasing. The criticism can be made that they are not increasing enough, but despite the difficulties of the pandemic, CMS collections have continued to increase; they rose by 8% between 2018 to 2021, and in 2021 some 71% of paying parents who used the collect and pay service were complaint.

In the quarter ending December 2021, a total of £46.6 million was paid through the collect and pay service; in addition, £210 million was due to be paid through direct pay arrangements. As a result of child maintenance payments, between 2018-19 and 2020-21—the most recent period for which there are statistics—the households of some 140,000 children were taken out of the category of low-income households. That goes to the point made by the hon. Member for Strangford and emphasises the desperate importance of this issue. It is particularly relevant in a cost of living crisis. Those payments are made both through family-based arrangements and the CMS.

The main point of the speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich was about enforcement, and I turn to that now. When a parent fails to support their child and fails to fulfil their financial responsibilities, a number of options cut in. If arrears have begun to accrue, the CMS aims to take immediate action to re-establish compliance. For example, £3 million was collected between October and December 2021 through CMS civil enforcement action.

There are other enforcement powers, too. If a non-compliant paying parent is employed, the service will first attempt to deduct the maintenance and any arrears directly from their earnings. That is done by a deductions from earnings order or request; employers are obliged by law to take that action. This represents a quick and efficient way of going directly to the source of income to obtain the money. We learn these lessons from those who are the best at this: the taxman, who basically goes to earnings directly and ensures that they get immediate recovery.

[Marion Fellows]

That works in the civilian world, but not always with certain military people. There are real issues with chasing them for child payments.

[Guy Opperman]

I will reveal the product of a conversation I had earlier with the hon. Lady. I take note of her point, and if she gives me details of specific examples, particularly if there are regiments where this is a problem, I and the Department will be most interested to know about them. Of course, it would be best if we could respond to them before her important Westminster Hall debate on Thursday.

Where earnings cannot be accessed directly and there is a solely-held bank account—an absent father or mother has a bank account in their name—deductions can be taken directly from that account, and administrative methods can then be used to take control of goods, passports and other things on an ongoing basis.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich talked about sanctions. We clearly use them only as a last resort, but a paying parent found guilty in court of wilful refusal to pay, or of culpable neglect in relation to payment of arrears, may be prevented from holding or obtaining a driving licence for up to two years, or alternatively may be committed to prison. As I indicated, we have also got the power to disqualify non-compliant parents from having a passport. Those are pretty serious penalties, but I take the point that that is not a direct penalty for the offending behaviour.