Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government how much Child Maintenance Service payment was reduced to receiving parents because of “special expenses” relating to travel to visit family in (1) 2020–21, (2) 2021–22, (3) 2022–23, and (4) 2023–24.

Special expense variations allow the Child Maintenance Service to look at some circumstances which are not covered by the basic maintenance calculation. A parent may apply for a variation at any time during the life of their case. If we accept a variation and it subsequently succeeds, we adjust the maintenance calculation accordingly.

Special expense variations are:

• contact costs
• illness or disability of relevant other child
• prior debts
• boarding school fees
• payments in respect of certain mortgages, loans, or insurance policies.

The Child Maintenance Service holds collective data for all special expense variation categories but we do not hold specific data for each individual category. As data is not readily available, to provide this would incur disproportionate cost.