Statistics from
the Child Support Agency (CSA) show the overall performance gains
achieved since 2006 continue to be sustained. More than £1,146m in
maintenance was collected or arranged in 2010, up from £1,135m in
the previous year. Total uncollected arrears, accumulated over the
entire 17-year lifetime of the Agency, remained stable at around £3,787m.
The figures also reveal that nearly 700 properties owned by
parents with child maintenance debts have been targeted for
possible possession and sale to pay off their arrears. The Agency
has deployed new enforcement powers and increased its use of
existing legal processes in order to keep child maintenance
payments moving.
So far, orders for the sale of 100 properties have been granted
though only a handful have had to be seized. The strategy has been
to arrest the growth in maintenance debt and prevent parents
running up arrears running into tens of thousands of pounds.
The new powers include Deduction Orders, where money is forcibly
removed from bank accounts. More than 600 lump sum and regular
payment orders have been imposed, so far raising in excess of £1
million. The Agency is also pursuing the estates of more than 600
deceased parents so their children will benefit from their
legacies.
“The number of children benefiting from maintenance payments has
increased by more than 50% since 2005 when performance began to
improve. We are putting more and more of our efforts into
re-establishing compliance when payments are missed and making
increasing use of our wide range of enforcement powers,"
said Child Maintenance Commissioner Stephen Geraghty.
A mother from the Midlands, who was awarded over £17,000 thanks
to a deduction order after her ex-partner refused to pay child
maintenance for ten years, said the money has got her and her
family out of debt.
“My child has suffered for years from her dad not paying what
she’s owed”, she said. “This has helped me pay off loans I had to
take out to support my daughter. I’ve also taken her abroad on
holiday for the first time in years. The money has improved the
life of my daughter tremendously.”
Enforcement powers are used only after other recovery methods
have been tried and where it is believed the parent has the means
to pay but is refusing to do so.
NOTES TO EDITORS
1. The CSA’s Quarterly Summary of Statistics for October
–December 2010 include new and additional information on the use
of enforcement powers and details of the Agency’s performance by
local authority area. The full release can be viewed here:
http://www.childmaintenance.org/en/publications/statistics.html
2. The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission is the
body responsible for the child maintenance system in Great
Britain. Its role is to promote financial responsibility for
children, provide the Child Maintenance Options information and
support service and to develop and direct the statutory child
maintenance service currently provided by the Child Support
Agency. Under the Public Bodies Bill now before Parliament the
Commission will become an executive agency of the Department for
Work and Pensions.
3. The Government’s proposed reforms of the child maintenance
system are set out in DWP consultation paper ‘Strengthening
families, promoting parental responsibility: the future of child
maintenance’ which can be viewed at:
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/consultations/2011/strengthening-families.shtml
4. Child maintenance legislation creates two types of
deduction order – Lump Sum Deduction Orders (which freezes and
later deducts a lump sum of child maintenance arrears from an
account) and Regular Deduction Orders (which instruct a
deposit-taker to make ongoing deductions for child maintenance
from a specified account).
5. All separated parents are already free to set up their own
child maintenance arrangements and can access free information and
support from Child Maintenance Options at www.cmoptions.org. Tel.
0800 988 0988
Contacts:
NDS Enquiries
Phone: For enquiries please contact the issuing dept
ndsenquiries@coi.gsi.gov.uk
For further information please contact the Child Maintenance and
Enforcement Commission Press Office on 020 7853 8082-83
media@childmaintenance.gsi.gov.uk