§ Mr. WebbTo ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will estimate the value of accrued entitlements to the child maintenance bonus among lone parents in receipt of income support; and if he will make it his policy to preserve accrued entitlements to the child maintenance bonus once the new child support rules are applied to all families. [132487]
§ Mr. PondThe information on the value of accrued entitlements to the child maintenance bonus among lone parents on income support is not available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
An extended period of one month, rather than the usual 14 days, to meet the work condition for the payment of child maintenance bonus has been put in place for cases transferring to the new child support scheme. To go further would require the maintenance of a substantial number of records for an indefinite period, thereby increasing administrative costs.
The child maintenance bonus was a feature of the old child support scheme, introduced in 1997 to give parents with care receiving income support or income-related Job Seeker's Allowance the benefit of up to £5 a week of the maintenance paid, when they returned to work. In the new scheme, the bonus will be replaced by the child maintenance premium, which will ensure that up to £10 a week of the maintenance that is paid will pass to the parent with care, while she is still on benefit. We estimate that the annual cost of child maintenance premium will be more than four times that which would have been spent in a year on a continued child maintenance bonus scheme.