Clause 12
Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill
5:15 pm
Danny Alexander (Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Work & Pensions; Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey, Liberal Democrat)
The hon. Lady shakes her head: I am sorry that we shall not be hearing from her any more.
The question is that if the previous functions under the 1991 Act are to be transferred nem. con., with the exceptions of the six listed items in subsection (2), to what extent is the measure really a clean break? That is open to question. I invite the Minister to explain how he sees the issue. The Select Committee also expressed concern that CMEC will run three different systems in parallel for a time. Again, that seems not to represent the clean break proposed by Henshaw.
In that context, it is worth referring briefly to the issue of public confusion and misunderstanding about what is happening. CMEC will take over roles from the previous system. There has been talk in the press of the abolition of the CSA and a clean break, which has rightly reflected the Government’s own line on the matter, but it has given rise to a great deal of confusion in the general public and among the base of people who make use of the CSA and who may in future make use of CMEC.
Simply lumping everything in with the new agency is perhaps not the best way to make things clear. I hope, therefore, that as well as the points that the Minister will undoubtedly wish to make, he will also respond to the important issues of the public’s understanding of what is going on and whether the Bill really is the fundamental change that my party wishes to see.