Written evidence to be reported to the House

Part of Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 12:00 pm on 17 July 2007.

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Janet Allbeson: Ultimately, if a voluntary agreement breaks down, CMEC must be there to step in. That is the simplest way of dealing with it. We want CMEC to focus on running a good statutory scheme. In our view, that is its primary responsibility, and if it can get an efficient statutory scheme going, voluntary agreements will be encouraged in the shadow of it, because people will know that, if they do not stick to their voluntary agreement, the agency will step in smoothly and efficiently—not necessarily belligerently—and get the money going again.

On offering a really good service of information and advice for parents, often when they are at the point of separation and relationship breakdown, there will be a lot of bitterness and pain. There will be many issues to sort out, of which child maintenance will be just one small part. There might be debt, housing, and rights on cohabitation and contact to sort out. CMEC is stepping in to a wider spectrum where that maintenance arrangement will work only if that wider picture is dealt with properly. The DWP cannot do that on its own.

We are proposing, at least, that pilots be set up. Let us consider advice services run by other Departments: we have a relationship breakdown programme run by the Ministry of Justice and the Department for Children, Schools and Families. The DCSF also runs a parent know-how fund, which gives advice on parenting. The Department of Trade and Industry runs financial inclusion of debt services. There are a lot of different pots of advice and information out there.

We wrote to the Chancellor, to the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families and to the Secretary of State for Justice saying that we wanted some pooling of resources to pilot a service for separating and separated families that would help them manage and support them in order to get the best outcomes for  children. Research suggests that non-resident parents are more likely to pay maintenance if there is some parental involvement. There has been a lot of fuss about lone parents supposedly refusing contact. Well, lone parents have said to us: “We want more contact. Why does he not get more involved?” There is a sort of consensus that, if non-resident parents can be more involved—providing it is safe, of course—it has very good outcomes for children. We wrote a joint letter with Fathers Direct, and got a lot of other parents organisations to sign up with us, asking for cross-Government funding and backing for a new service for separated and separating parents.

Returning to CMEC, we are sceptical about how effective the information and guidance system will be in supporting voluntary arrangements. A telephone line and a website are a start, and we know from our own research into the advice needs of lone parents that they like the telephone, because they can ring when they get home from work or after they put their kids to bed. So it is a good start. Often you can get a diagnosis over the phone about your problems and advice on where to go, but where do you go? There is a lack of capacity, because parents also want face-to-face discussion about their options. Should they go for the mortgage being paid or for child maintenance? What about getting their debts paid off first? Would that help? People have individual situations that need to be sorted out. There is a need for advice and information, but given the limited resources that the DWP has to devote to this, we are sceptical about whether it can do what is necessary in order to really increase voluntary arrangements.