Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 5 September 2019 to Question 285165 on Children: Maintenance, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of devolving the calculation of child maintenance liabilities to Scotland.

Child Maintenance remains a power that is reserved at Westminster and no formal assessment has been made of the potential merits of devolving the calculation of liabilities to Scotland. It is important that the rules used to calculate a child maintenance liability are applied consistently to avoid the complexities for clients that would result from applying different rules to different parts of the UK.