Clause 29
Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill
3:15 pm
Andrew Selous (Shadow Minister, Work & Pensions; South West Bedfordshire, Conservative)
The Minister was gracious enough to see me, which I appreciated. Although I have not heard from that particular constituent for a while, which I take as good news, I am pleased to tell him that the case has been solved.
That particular parent with care regularly came to my surgery to tell me how her ex-husband had bought a tent or a guitar for his children. He was not paying any maintenance, but he bought the children a tent, a guitar, new trainers or a trip to Thorpe Park, when they had perfectly serviceable trainers and probably needed a new pair of school shoes. His argument to the mother was to say quite bluntly, “Well, I’ve made payments. I’ve given money to the children. I’ve spent my money.” He was not paying the maintenance that he was required to, week by week, which she needed to feed and clothe the children, to put new school shoes on their feet and so on. I hope that that case illustrates what we are discussing.
I have no reason to doubt the good intentions of the Minister or the staff of the commission, but it would be a real assurance to parents with care if the Bill stated that they had to agree to any offsetting of payments. There may be cases in which non-resident parents have made payments in lieu of child maintenance payments which the parent with care is happy to have offset against the payments that should have been made according to the CSA at present and CMEC in future. It is important that there is written permission from the parent with care before that offsetting is agreed.
Amendment No. 22, which relates to clause 30 rather than to clause 29, refers to the power of CMEC to accept part payment of arrears in full and final settlement. Again, the amendment tries to set out that there may be circumstances where that is the right thing to do, but it should happen only with the express, written agreement of any person to whom arrears of child support maintenance are owed. That does not seem to be too much to ask, and I shall refer shortly to some of the evidence given by Lord McKenzie, the Minister’s colleague in another place.
Amendment No. 23, which relates to clause 31, deals with what we would like to see happen when the commission decides to write off arrears of child maintenance. There may be occasions when the parent with care is perfectly happy for that to happen, given the particular circumstances of that case. Given that it is money owed in most cases to the mother and, most importantly, to the children, it is vital to have the written permission of anyone to whom arrears of child support maintenance are owed.
At our first sitting, Lord McKenzie said:
“But it is clear that we would only write off where we had the consent of the parent with care, and only when the commission recommended to the parent with care that it might be appropriate. So any inappropriate offers would be screened out by the commission, and only in those circumstances and specifically with the consent of the parent with care would the debt be written off.”——[Official Report, Child Maintenance and Other Payments Public Bill Committee, 17 July 1007; c. 34.]
Amendments Nos. 22 and 23 simply seek to put that assurance, given freely by the Minister, in the Bill.