Maintenance Orders (Hansard, 1 February 1973)

§ 5. Mr. Dalyell
asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department how 1590 many letters he received in January 1973 from women awarded alimony by court order who had not received it.

§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Carlisle)
Seven letters were received in January 1973 from women complaining about the enforcement of maintenance orders in magistrates' courts in England and Wales.

§ Mr. Dalyell
The Minister may have had seven, but I have had 83 since the Mechanics of Payment of Aliment Bill. Does the hon. and learned Gentleman realise that there are a great many women—perhaps I have been partly responsible for this—[Laughter.]—whose hope have been built up. As the report of the Finer Committee is disappearing into the distant future, could this question be hived off from the main part of the committee's deliberations, and something done about it?

§ Mr. Carlisle
I do not know about the hon. Gentleman's hopes, but he obviously gets rather more letters from women on this subject than does the Home Office. He has had 83 in one month, whereas the Home Office received 67 in the whole of 1971 and 59 in the whole of 1972. I am not sure on what evidence the hon. Gentleman says that the Finer Committee report is disappearing further into the future. As far as I know, the Finer Committee is shortly to report.

§ Mrs. Shirley Williams
My respect for the capacities of my hon. Friend the Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell) is boundless, but I do not hold him responsible for this problem. May I ask the Minister of State to look at this again? Most people in this position write to their Member of Parliament rather than to the Home Office, and I should be surprised if most hon. Members on both sides of the House have not encountered this problem as one of the most substantial they come across. There is no doubt but that women who are just above the supplementary benefits level, and therefore cannot gain from the mechanics now adopted by the Supplementary Benefits Commission, are often in a desperate plight, especially those who have young children when the courts' decisions are not carried out.

§ Mr. Carlisle
I assure the hon. Lady that I am fully aware of the seriousness 1591 of this problem, as I think I have said every month to the hon. Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell)when he has tabled Questions about the number of letters received. Within the lest two years we have brought in the Attachment of Earnings Act 1971, and we are still awaiting the report of the Finer Committee, which was set up by the Labour party, on the whole problem of one-parent families. We shall certainly look with interest at that report when we receive it.

§ 23. Mr. David James
asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will introduce legislation to change the law whereby persons unable to work and in receipt of sickness benefit can be consigned to prison for arrears on a court maintenance order.

§ Mr. Carlisle
A magistrates' court may commit a maintenance defaulter to prison only if it considers after inquiry in the defendant's presence that the default is due to wilful refusal or culpable neglect to pay. My right hon. Friend sees no need, therefore, for legislation on the lines proposed.

§ Mr. James
My hon. and learned Friend will know of the two cases I have in mind. Can he tell me what public advantage there can be in sending a man who has one collapsed lung and emphysema in the other lung, in receipt of £11.51 supplementary benefit, from his own bed to a prison hopsital bed for six weeks for £60 arrears of maintenance? Will my hon. and learned Friend recognise the fact that I have another constituent who has a suspended prison sentence hanging over his head for the same offence—if we can call it an offence—whose recovery from multiple injuries sustained in a road accident is being materially retarded by frequent appearances in court?

§ Mr. Carlisle
First, it is not an offence. I shall willingly look at the cases to which my hon. Friend refers. However, he would not expect me to comment on individual cases. Magistrates' courts have the power to impose imprisonment, but only if they are satisfied that the failure to pay is due to wilful refusal or culpable neglect.