Clause 23
Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill
1:30 pm
Mark Harper (Shadow Minister, Work & Pensions; Forest of Dean, Conservative)
One of the general points that we are very supportive of is whether the appeals mechanism can question the calculation. We decided not to table amendments on that; our amendments come in a later group. The hon. Gentleman made a sensible point. If the information is not available, non-resident parents could be in a Kafkaesque situation. They could be told that an amount of maintenance was liable, and the commission would be able to make the decisions about liability and enforcement of the order, but they might not be able to know how the calculation had been made, what they are being asked to pay and for what reason. The extra transparency would be valuable. It may be that the intention always was that it should be part of the process, but nothing is lost in having it spelled out. We are generally very supportive of the amendment.