Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to correct the computer error in the child maintenance system on the collection of arrears.

There were well-documented IT failures in the 1993 and 2003 Child Support Agency (CSA) statutory child maintenance scheme systems. The Coalition government introduced a new Child Maintenance scheme in 2012 which addresses these issues. This is operated by the Child Maintenance Service and used a pathfinder approach to introduce new IT systems in a slow, safe and controlled way. The 2012 scheme systems are designed to be more cost-effective and overcome the key failings associated with the 1993 and 2003 CSA schemes and systems. We will be closing all the cases on the old schemes, and we are continuing to pursue existing debt.