To ask why child maintenance is automatically reduced due to subsequent children?

[freegazelle]

This doesn't affect me personally, but I came across this rule on mumsnet and its just been bugging me.

If I coupled up with a man who had DC from a previous relationship, I'd take them into account when working out if we could afford children, just as I'd take my own DC into account. Why should his responsibilities towards his existing DC automatically be reduced after we have another child?

Other countries don't apply this in the same way - in the US it depends on the State and in Canada CM is not reduced unless apply for "undue hardship" (as far as I understand).

Am I missing something?

"it's not a gender issue" - this is absolutely is a women's issue and should be approached with all the enthusiasm of the metoo campaign and the gender pay gap. Opting out of parenting should not be the easy option that the UK allows it to be. We are entirely tolerant of absent fathers and utterly unsupportive of single mothers.

The treatment of single parents by our society impacts all women, we should support each other in promoting respect for rps and the difficulties they face by putting their children first. A quarter of families raising children for our society's future are single parents and 90% of those are women, strong working age women being cornered at every turn by the system.

Have a read at the latest Gingerbread report for some sobering facts.

www.gingerbread.org.uk/policy-campaigns/publications-index/one-four-profile-single-parents-uk/

From Gingerbread -

9% of single parents with dependent children are fathers. 11% of single fathers are bereaved, compared with just 2% single mothers.

In 2017, there were around 1.7 million single parent families in the UK.

Single parents make up nearly one in four families with children, and have done for nearly 20 years.

Nine in ten single parent families are headed by a single mother. This has remained largely consistent over the past two decades.

The average age of a single parent in 2017 was 39 years old. Around eight out of ten single parents are aged between 25 and 50 years old.

One in four single parent households had a disabled adult, compared with around a fifth of couple parent households in the UK in 2015/16.

The difference is even more pronounced for children – 16% of single parent households had at least one child with a disability, compared with 9% of couple parent households.

A third of children with a working single parent lived in relative poverty in 2015/16.

75% of couple mothers were in work in 2017, compared with 68% of single parents.

Single parents have the highest poverty rate among working age households. Single parents and their children have faced around twice the risk of poverty as couples for the past 20 years. In 2015, around 20% of single parents lived in persistent poverty, compared with just 5% of couple parents (ONS, 2017). 63% of children in single parent families are expected to live in poverty by 2021/22.

Government should:
»» End charges to use the child maintenance system, rather than penalise receiving parents who cannot get maintenance through no fault of their own
»» Ensure a zero tolerance approach to child maintenance non-payment and avoidance, including more robust enforcement action, widened grounds to challenge calculations and improved working with HMRC.

These are ambitious actions and require political choices over public spending. Without this, single parents will continue to be disadvantaged by family structure despite their ambitions for themselves and their family.

Sure, but loads of people don't adequately budget for having children, do they? If they did, no one would be dependent (even partly) on benefits.

This is a terrible argument. You can't live in a civilised society where only the very rich who have enough savings to guarantee a lifetime of financial security can have kids. Personally I'm more worried about the environment than financial impact of having kids anyway.

In terms of the OP I think it's just a larger issue with Child maintenance that the NRP has to pay "what they can afford" usually leaving them with a sizeable portion of their income. While the RP has to make it work and provide for their DC whether they can afford to or not.

TBF if you were on benefits you wouldn't have to pay anything either.

a grown man fully capable of working with no depedants choosing not to work so he can avoid cm shouldnt be allowed to happen. its funny how he still has to pay arrears for other things. they dont get wiped off just because hes on jsa.

It is ridiculous isn't it?

There needs to be a base level of the cost of raising a child which is required to be met by both parents.

There is absolutely no other debt allowed to accrue in the way that maintenance arrears does.

I never cease to be amazed at the number of second families who feel it is perfectly acceptable to reduce the maintenance paid when they decide to have more children. It sends a disgusting message to the existing child and is really shitty parenting. You don't get to half your mortgage/rent payment or not bother with the electric bill or council tax for a year whilst you are on maternity leave so why the fuck would it seem reasonable in any way to cut child maintenance - an outgoing that should take priority over everything else!

If you want more children you have to be able to afford to do so without financially impacting the existing children otherwise you cannot afford it. A realistic base maintenance rate that must be met regardless would do away with this kind of idiotic optional parenting approach.

a grown man fully capable of working with no depedants choosing not to work so he can avoid cm shouldnt be allowed to happen. its funny how he still has to pay arrears for other things. they dont get wiped off just because hes on jsa.

That's a very specific situation and not one I'm condoning, though I'm sceptical of how common it is for people to choose a life on jsa. To my knowledge you are still liable to pay cm even on jsa so it would be a foolish choice and a rather sparse existence even if cm could be avoided.

Still, my point was that an RP who was fully reliant on benefits wouldn't have to pay anything as they'd be getting their money from the state. They wouldn't have to pay any of that back like an nrp would either.

IamXX Debt enforcement in this country is a joke whether it is CM or small claims or commercial debt.

It really is no use saying that men should not father subsequent children and women should not enable them; they do and they will. Castration and sterilisation are not options. And when they do those children have mouths to be fed and bodies to be clothed.

The ridiculous results some PPe mention are a function of replacing court-determined outcomes, where both sides are heard and there is some attempt to produce a result which reflects the individual circumstances, with the calculation-from-a-table model we have had since 1990. But I fear that that bus has left the station.

They wouldn't have to pay any of that back like an nrp would either

Sine when did any parent have to pay back any benefits?

well since he has been on jsa for 6 years i would say thats choosing to live on benefits. and my point was he still has to pay arrears on rent and tv license which he told me about they dont just say that he doesnt have to pay them because he is on benefits so why is child maintenance different?

People really dont know how bitter some exes can be. Great for you if youve never experienced it but I know a few men who have quit their jobs as soon as their ex claims maintenance. I even know someone who got their new partner who they had another kid with to claim cm despite the fact they were together so that his only had to pay his ex half.

If a NRP is earning, he should have to pay half of what it costs for EACH child.

Not just what he could afford. It's bullshit

Also, unrelated. The 2 kids limit is effectively discriminatory!

A man could go and impregnate 10 women and all will get benefits.

A woman can only have 2 children.

A woman can only have 2 children.
since when. That is only true that the parent claiming benefits (AKA tax credits) is restricted to 2 lots of CTC. There is still child benefit
If you are referring to the fact that a man can have umpteen kids with differant women - that is where he should pay for them and each mother can claim for the child/children in question (up to 2).

The CTC /CB is for the child - not for the parent(s)

Getinmynelly wages would have to be considerably higher to enable
That to happen and them to half.s my partner earns £1100 a month. He has two kids from a previous relationship, I have one and we have one together so four kids. He couldn't afford to pay his ex half of it every month as we would lose our massively and the boys would be affected as we would risk losing our home xx

later children shouldn’t suffer for being younger.

This.

I am coming at this from the pov of someone who is married to a man who already had a DC. Should I not have been allowed to have children because he already had one? His ex left him, he has always paid what he could afford (in excess of CSA amount), but he did reduce the amount when our DC was born (in line with CSA guidelines). His ex and her partner earn 3x what we earn but my child should be worse off because my step-child was born first?

Because they system is set up to hider the resident parents that is nearly always female

GetInMyNelly

If a NRP is earning, he should have to pay half of what it costs for EACH child.

Not just what he could afford. It's bullshit

this why should my child suffer because ex can’t keep it in his pants on US they don’t even let you get a marriage licence if you owe CS because the view is i you can’t pay for the kids you already have you have no business starting a new family you can’t afford it

well since he has been on jsa for 6 years i would say thats choosing to live on benefits. and my point was he still has to pay arrears on rent and tv license which he told me about they dont just say that he doesnt have to pay them because he is on benefits so why is child maintenance different?

If you were wholly reliant on benefits, the state would give you money for yourself and your child. If the NRP is wholly reliant on benefits, they receive money for themselves and their CM contributions must come from that. If they fail to make those payments the state does so on their behalf and later expects this money back. In each case the state is making the financial contributions of either parent, but only one is accruing arrears.

"BottleOfJameson

In terms of the OP I think it's just a larger issue with Child maintenance that the NRP has to pay "what they can afford" usually leaving them with a sizeable portion of their income. While the RP has to make it work and provide for their DC whether they can afford to or not."

Excellent point

they receive money for themselves and their CM contributions must come from that. If they fail to make those payments the state does so on their behalf and later expects this money back

Money is taken direct from benefits. It isn’t paid on behalf of the NRP with an expectation it is paid back.

why should my child suffer because ex can’t keep it in his pants on US they don’t even let you get a marriage licence if you owe CS because the view is i you can’t pay for the kids you already have you have no business starting a new family you can’t afford it

Not true. Some States used to have such laws but the courts have struck them down. And rightly so.

Not true. Some States used to have such laws but the courts have struck them down. And rightly so.
*really rightly so if your saying you can’t afford to pay CM already why would you have more children answer you can afford to pay but are choosing not to.

Rightly so because the right of two single adults to marry is not to be limited by means.

In any event stopping an NRP from (re-)marrying does not stop him, usually him, from having further issue.

Presumedly child support is to cover electricity, mortgage, food etc. All which get cheaper when divided by more people. Sections children often get childcare discounts and wear hand me downs. They are never the same cost as the first one for many reasons.

Whilst this is true the reduction in child maintenance is actually to benefit the NRP when they have or shack up with someone who has more children.

My ex moving in with his g/f & her 3 kids don't make a blind bit of difference to the amount of people my rent or electricity is divided by but it's me that gets less.

Re: stepchildren being taken into account – I guess because the government assesses finances on a household, not an individual basis all the time. Just like they cut tax credits etc for the RP if they have a partner move in. The assumption is, I suppose, that a household are all financially responsible for each other, whether they are related by blood or not. It’s why stepparents’ income gets taken into account for student loans etc.

And yet "household income" isn't used to calculate maintenance payments