Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill

Part of deferred division – in the House of Commons at 4:58 pm on 4 July 2007.

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Photo of James Plaskitt James Plaskitt Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Work and Pensions 4:58, 4 July 2007

We have had a thoughtful debate—I am inclined to say that it was something of a specialist debate—during which the Bill has received broad general support from hon. Members on both sides of the House, which I welcome. The Government accept that we have come to the end of a road on which we all embarked in 1990 with the White Paper that heralded the introduction of the Child Support Agency. The agency was brought into being because of the failures of the previous court-based arrangements. It is worth remembering that the White Paper referred to that court system as

"fragmented, uncertain in its results, slow and ineffective".

It continued:

"In a great many instances, the maintenance awarded is not paid or the payments fall into arrears".

Since then, successive Governments have tried to tackle the issue of securing child maintenance via the CSA. As we all know, there were valid reasons for embarking on such a route in the first place. There have been valiant attempts to try to make the system work. However, we have come to the view that the system is fundamentally flawed. Despite the fact that billions of pounds in maintenance have been collected by the CSA, and despite the fact that more than 650,000 children are currently being supported with maintenance payments as a result of the CSA, confidence in the agency has been lost. That is why we came to the conclusion that a new approach was necessary.

The main lesson learned by all of us is that the CSA approach was just too complex. The agency was being asked to do too much: it was asked to be the calculator, the adjudicator, the administrator and the enforcer. Indeed, as the National Audit Office concluded in 2006:

"With hindsight, the Agency was never structured in a way that would enable the policy to be delivered cost effectively."

Since taking the decision in 2006 to make a fresh start, we have moved quickly. We have been strongly supported by the staff in the existing agency who, above all else, want to be part of a successful child support system.

The new start envisaged by the Bill has today been widely welcomed by Members across the House, and by virtually all the stakeholders who have commented on the proposals so far. I cannot improve on the observations of the Child Poverty Action Group, which said:

"the Bill provides an important opportunity to improve the lives of children and families."

That is exactly so.

I turn to the main points raised in this afternoon's debate. To begin with the issues raised by the Opposition Front Benchers, Chris Grayling rightly spoke of the frustration felt by many parents with care, and indeed by some non-resident parents, as a result of the problems with the agency. I was pleased that he moved on to say that the Conservatives share our aspirations for the Bill. He said that, at the moment, it is too easy for too many parents to evade their responsibilities, but that is why the Bill envisages significant new enforcement powers. Mrs. Miller asked about those powers, which are very important. There are new powers to give us means of accessing accounts, powers relating to financial institutions, powers to notify credit reference agencies—that can have a significant impact, particularly on self-employed people—and, of course, powers giving access to Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs income records. All those measures will help us to prevent people from evading their responsibilities.

It was disappointing when the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell tried to suggest that there had been 10 years of neglect, and that disappointment was made obvious by other Members who spoke. There was, of course, a programme of improvements in 2000, which was implemented in 2003, and which the Conservative Front Benchers of the time supported. More recently, we introduced the operational improvement plan, which, again, was welcomed by the Opposition Front Benchers. It has been in operation for only a year, but already 58,000 more children receive maintenance payments, and the backlog of uncleared cases is down by 80,000 since we got going with the plan. It is not the case that there has been 10 years of no effort to try to make the agency work better.

The hon. Gentleman asked what was different about the envisaged reform. He said that the transfer of the same staff implied that there would not be any difference. That is unreasonable to the staff, who cannot be blamed for the systemic failures in the agency's design and who want to be part of a successful operation. Indeed, it is important to retain their expertise so that they can help us as we go forward with the new operation. He wanted to know about the IT system. A number of fixes are being rolled out right now, and it is important to get that right before the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission assumes all its responsibilities. He wondered why the process was taking some time, but of course we are taking time to ensure that we get it right this time.

The hon. Gentleman overlooked other measures included in the proposal that show just how different the new system is. I have already spoken about the new powers; we are also introducing new support for voluntary agreements and repealing section 6 of the Child Support Act 1991, which has forced so many people who did not need to use the agency into contact with it. There is a new information platform that we can work from, which includes data-sharing with HMRC, and there will be a wider use of disregard. Those are all fundamental changes.

The hon. Gentleman asked about the role of the voluntary sector, which indeed has an extremely important part to play in helping us deliver the reforms. We are in discussion with the voluntary sector about the evolution of the support and advice services, which will be an important part of the new arrangements.

The hon. Gentleman complained about the lack of detail at this stage, but if we have learned anything from the experience of the CSA, surely it is the importance of getting the detail right. He will understand that the Bill puts in place the basic architecture. It is crucial in many respects that the commission be allowed to evolve particular ways of doing things in the light of the duties with which it will be charged under the Bill. That is the right way to go, as opposed to the more micro-managed and over-complex approach which bedevilled the agency. We must learn the lessons from the agency. Regulations will be rolled out over 2008 to 2010 before the CMEC becomes fully operational.