to be astounded that the CSA are going to take a cut of maintenance payments?

[Inertia]

Link here : m.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/jan/13/fees-child-maintenance-intervention?cat=society&type=article

How on earth can the government justify this ?

You know what, the system is screwed, we all know that. I've often come close to giving up on chasing the CSA because of all the hassle it's caused me over the past 4.5 years, but have fought on because I believe that a child is the responsibility of both parents, not just one. However, if this comes into force I'll have to give up on chasing maintenance, for the financial reasons stated in my previous post.

At least if it comes to that I can hold my head high knowing I'm doing a good job bringing my son up on my own. I'm not the parent who walked away without a backward glance or a care in the world, I stuck around and brought my son up. Unlike my ex, I have nothing to be ashamed of and lots to be proud of. I have to hold on to that fact because when constantly facing obstacles like this, being continually vilified by the media and judged by society as a whole, sometimes it's all I have.

hissymissy

If you work school hours and don't need childcare except for holidays you need to use holiday clubs (most childminders I researched wouldn't dp just the school holidays).
Working Tax credits state they will not pay for holiday clubs and schemes, only for registered childminders in the strictest sense. As advised to me by both them and the Jobcentre

Softkittywarmkitty

Its not right, at all. Single parents shouldn't be villified for the actions of their ex's and shouldn't be forced or expected to stay with them.
Why should they because some selfish person doesn't believe in community and because of that the children suffer.

For a country going on about child poverty they aren't doing a good job with this. Never mind Jamie Oliver and his bizarre views. Because of him my 'local homegrown' produce at my greengrocers and supermarket have gone so far up in price I am buying tins and frozen veg. And Joanna Lumley seemed to think in the Telegraph not long ago that we should copy the example of Ethopia and do the equivalent of sending a seven year old out to tend the goats all day with nothing but a chipati and a whistle lol

With that kind of 'support' there's no hope for this country :)

So many bad policies. I cant believe these idiots are running the country!!!

The ONLY place where it is appropriate to charge for the services of the CSA is an extra charge applied to the non resident parent for avoiding or evading payment.

That is pretty outrageous.

Would work better the other way.

Sort of a no win no fee arrangement.

So if in order to get paid the CSA had to take it from the NRP, I bet they would get a lot more effective.

I completely agree, Morloth. I suspect the reason they won't do that is because their projcted failure rate indicates to them that it won't be very lucrative.

SO many problems with this proposal. Am I being really stupid not to understand what happens when the new system is set up? Will everyone currently being dealt with have to re-apply? If so then what happens to the arrears (as already pointed out) and also, won't there be a glut of new applications, causing the new system to spontaneously combust?

On the other hand a no win no fee system seems an excellent idea!

That's shocking.
I go through the Australian CSA and while my ex still won't pay, they are pretty good at updating me with what is happening, and they are taking steps to recover money from him.
I don't pay them anything, in fact when I call them they call straight back, so they pay for the international call!

Just on a point of fact, someone stated that the majority of NRP's pay maintenance.

That is not true. The majority of NRP's do not pay maintenance.

They pay lip service to the idea that they love their kids, would do anything for their kids, would die for their kids, blah di blah di fucking blah - but 60% of them - yes, 60%, the majority - don't pay a penny in maintenance. And those who do, normally pay peanuts.

We are still very much in a mental state which says children are the responsiblility of whoever happens to live with them and if someone (male) wants to walk out on their kids and not support them financially, that's fine. (It's different if it's someone female of course - if you're a woman and you walk out on your kids, you are vilified, even if you financially support them.)

And the government supports this state of affairs and wants to introduce rules that will make this problem even worse.

Don't anyone ever tell me that we expect men to support their kids in the event of divorce. Not until at least 80% of them are paying maintenance and we can put the other 20% down as being a few bad apples. At the moment it is the majority of non resident parents (90% of whom are fathers) who don't think that parental responsibility includes financially supporting your children.

How the fuck has that happened?

On the flip side dh had paid every week without fail, when he was one week, out of 12 years of payment, by £5, his ex went to CSA.

They have done nothing but mess the payments around and cause trouble for everyone.

*one week short of £5 (he had £45 instead of £50 and told her he would pay her the £5 the follwing friday)

As the govt encourages people to make private agreements, and charging people to use the CSA will push people in that direction, it is worth knowing that these private arrangements can be insured against default. Try googling maintenance protection insurance.

I don't know how they find these statistics.

I'm a lone parent, we have a private agreement no one has asked us what we do. I don't know anyone who uses the CSA.

So this 60% figure where does it come from?

I also think 50-50 shared care should be the default.

No CSA then. Both parents have to support the children.

As the govt encourages people to make private agreements, and charging people to use the CSA will push people in that direction, it is worth knowing that these private arrangements can be insured against default. Try googling maintenance protection insurance.

I think 50/50 should be the starting point too, the courts are heavily biased towards women. 50/50 would mean the child gets equal time with both parents and both then contribute evenly towards raising the child.

HerBeX "who don't think that parental responsibility includes financially supporting your children" - there are lots of PWC that dont financially support their children either and so the state picks up the cost. BOTH parents should support the child not just one following a split.

As for the original point, I just dont see what is so wrong with having to pay for a service that you use - i'd love lots of things in life to be free but they are not.

Because the reason RP's have to use the service in the first place, is because non resident parents are not prepared to support their children financially. The reason the CSA was set up in the first place, was because even more than 60% of NRP's used to not pay - it used to be even higher. Why should RP's be penalised for the lack of responsible behaviour by NRP's? The NRP's should pay.

70% of PWC with children over the age of 5, do work in the cash economy and those who don't, generally don't because the way the workplace and school life is constructed, makes it very difficult to manage. And still 70% do.

I agree that the starting point should be 50 50 joint care and control, if both parents have done 50% of the child-care and made the same career sacrifices in order to do the childcare. If not however, it would be extremely disruptive for children to suddenly have their primary carer dramatically changed because their parents are getting divorced and doesn't recognise the career sacrifice made by the primary carer.

If you had a system where 50 50 care was the norm regardless of how the childcare had been done up to then, what would happen, is that the child would end up being cared for 50% of the time by his or her mother, 10% of the time by his or her father and 40% of the time by another woman - the father's new girlfriend or mother. Can't see why that's in the best interests of the child tbh.

If the cost gets passed on to the non-resident parent who is being chased for maintenance, doesn't that mean they would have a financial incentive to pay up without being difficult?

I mean, if these charges mean the parent responsible for childcare still gets the same amount but the parent paying maintenance is essentially being billed extra for being awkward about paying their share, won't that encourage them to pay up rather than waiting for the CSA to chase them?

Would you be happy to pay for the NHS then HappyMumof one?

Charging parents for use of the CSA will just mean that more families are driven into poverty. Some RPs get so little a contribution from the NRP that it will no longer be worth them making a claim once all the fees are taken into consideration.

But the RP will not get the same as before OTheHuge - that's why it's unfair. They are going to charge both parents.

electra Oh. I see. In that case I think it's a pretty fucking dumb idea, given that the RP who are having to chase NRPs for money are by definition likely to be the least able to pay.

Did anyone hear Maria Miller on radio 5 recently? She pretty much admitted that if a NRP is determined there's nothing they can do. When the interviewer (Vic Derbyshire) picked her up on it she squirmed a bit and started talking about "powers".

I wrote to her (below) but I'm not holding my breath for an answer-

Dear Mrs Miller,

My sister is your age ? I imagine that you were brought up, as we were, to obey the law and stick to the rules. I mistakenly believed that the other side of that contract was that those in authority would ensure laws were enforced ? but it now seems that the law is only an option for those who can be bothered to obey it, and those like my former brother-in-law who just laugh at us are allowed to get away scott free.
In view of comments you made on BBC Radio 5 recently, I wonder if you feel my sister should give up trying to obtain the maintenance arrears she is due (solely for her two children) and which the CSA has spectacularly failed to collect over a number of years?

Everything is a service and has to be paid for but in my view an agency who provides a service that helps children to be financially supported by both parents (the RP is assuming financial responsibility by default) is a good, reasonable use of public funds. As a single parent I'm biased of course, but I'm sure I would still think the same if I were still married.

'If an external body is paid to enforce maintenance payments then that body has a vested interest in getting the money rolling in'

I think this is a good point. At the moment the CSA is one hell of a crappy, inefficient service. I must have spent a fair bit on phone calls getting them to sort my case out and then phoning them (nearly!) every month to find out where the money is and why they are not chasing the employer to allocate it.