Childcare Payments Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 9:45 am on 28th October 2014.
Clauses 48 and 49 allow HMRC to exclude persons who have sought to abuse the scheme from benefiting from it. This is a sanction for abuse.
Clause 48 allows parents to be excluded in three circumstances: where they have acted dishonestly in the scheme; where they have been dishonest in obtaining another Government benefit; or where they have been penalised for their actions in the scheme on multiple occasions. Clause 49 allows child-care providers to be removed from the list of child-care providers that can receive payments from the parent under the scheme if they, too, have acted dishonestly.
Government amendment 23 makes a minor change to clause 48. It restricts exclusions from the scheme for persons abusing Government benefits to cases where the person is convicted of an offence.