§ 13. Mr. HainTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many parents with care and in receipt of income support are also receiving child support. [32984]
§ Mr. Andrew MitchellThe latest available information shows that 267,500 cases involve parents with care assessed to receive child support who are in receipt of income support.
§ 24. Mrs. Bridget PrenticeTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what assessment he has made of the number of absent parents who should be paying child support who are currently paying nothing; and what proportion of the total this represents. [329971]
§ Mr. MitchellSome 203,000 absent parents should be paying full child support maintenance assessments and 55,400–27 per cent.—are not currently paying. A further 73,000 absent parents should be paying interim maintenance assessments and 85 per cent. of them are not paying anything.
§ Ms LynneTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many former liable relative cases are currently under the responsibility of the Child Support Agency; and how many of these cases do not have a full maintenance assessment. [33774]
§ Mr. MitchellThis information is not available.
§ Mr. Jacques ArnoldTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what changes he intends to make to the legislation governing reduced benefit directions for those who fail, without good cause, to co-operate with child support provisions. [34662]
§ Mr. MitchellWe propose that reduced benefit directions should be increased to 40 per cent. of the adult income support personal allowance for three years, the penalty to be repeated at the end of each three-year period should the parent still be on benefit and unwilling to co-operate. We also propose to remove the six week cooling off period before the imposition of a reduced benefit direction from those parents with care who do not make written representations about their failure to comply. Amending legislation will be brought forward as part of a package of child support regulations which we intend to lay before the House on 26 June.
I believe that these changes will act as a disincentive to parents with care who are minded to collude with the absent parent to avoid child support maintenance and 109W encourage more parents with care to make contact with the Child Support Agency. The changes will be introduced alongside a range of operational improvements which are intended to make the processes involved and the advantages of co-operation clearer to parents with care.
§ 17. Mr. Mike O'BrienTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security on how many occasions the Child Support agency has provided inaccurate assessments of liability. [32990]
§ Mr. Andrew MitchellThe information requested is not available. However, significant improvements have been made by the agency and, as at the end of March this year, the accuracy level stood at 79 per cent.
§ 28. Mr. BennettTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what changes he plans to the regulations governing the Child Support Agency. [33001]
§ Mr. MitchellI refer the hon. Member to the oral answer that I gave today to my hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Arnold).