Child Maintenance-Should fathers on benefits pay more?

[CalmGreenWasp]

My ExP owns his home outright, receives in excess of £1,200/month in disability benefits and works cash in hand. His only outgoings are food and utility bills for himself. Is it fair that he only pays £7.00/week maintenance for our DD10? For context, I am a lone parent and own a mortgaged home. I slightly exceed the threshold for universal credit. My disposable household income after mortgage and bills equates to half his, but with two people to support. Is the system broke? Should disposable income be considered by CMS when paying parent is in receipt of benefits?

It is, he was diagnosed with drug induced psychosis 10 years ago and has claimed benefits ever since, despite working away

So he much psychosis he can go to work perfectly on his own

I don’t know what additional expenses drug induced psychosis incurs, apart from the £300/wk it takes to get high at the weekend

Well that doesnt make sense drug induced psychosis is usualy over fairly quickly
You cant continue to claim disabillty benefits .

Yes, drives there, talks to customers, negotiates contracts, does the work and makes sure he gets paid. I’m fairly certain the psychosis only kicks in again when he completes his PIP forms..but then again someone has to subsidise the drug habit. why not the taxpayer?

He has, and he does

But PIP fraud is just 1%

Many people can not work with out the help from Pip. It covers the extra costs needed to get to work ,to aupport them through the day. Would you rather they did not work

But in this case he requires no aids or adaptation to work, unless you count the coke to give him a pep in his step?

It would be aids and adaptation needed to do things like cooking a meal, taking meds etc. Or he might not be managing to do some every day things at all although it sounds more like he's just lied from what you've said before. Do you have evidence he's working? Could you send that to one of the authorities if you don't think they know?

I would probably have to hire a private investigator to go record him on a site, even then he could probably argue that he was helping a family member. Perhaps PIP claims on mental health grounds need to be more carefully considered to be deemed sufficiently serious to make an award? Eg being under the current care of a psychiatrist/cpn. Should a GPs letter and a continuing prescription really cut it?

It's very rare to get PIP for any condition if you're managing to work full time. Full time work usually (although not always) counts against anyone trying to claim. Hence why so few claimants are working. He probably knows this and it's why he's doing it unofficially. He will likely have told them he can't work.

Back when we were young my dad was ordered to pay 15p per year for the three of us never paid a penny he was on benefits at the time dads on benefits and child support has always been crap

I think the real issue here is that he is working cash in hand and paying the absolute minimum in CMS because his true income is not being declared.
The how and why he is on PIP should not really matter, and PIP should not be regarded for CMS anyway due to the fact it is awarded based on how someone's disability affects them, and not what money they have.

But until cash in hand work can be better detected etc, then I am not sure what the solution is.

There are also fathers who have 6 figure bank accounts, move hundreds of miles away from their children because their latest squeeze has dumped them and they need a new start, then choose not to work so that they can pay the £7 per week rate. And don’t even pay that despite being on collect and pay.

So no support whatsoever - financial or otherwise - and knows child’s mother cannot work due to the fact that both children are disabled and one currently is too unwell to go to school. But it’s ok, because what mother took in the divorce is enough for her and their children to live off.

when youngest child turns 18 mother will turn 60. Chance of resurrecting any sort of career is remote.

For every father who has tried to do the right thing and been shafted by CMS, there are these kind of fathers.

morally your ex, like this persons ex, is reprehensible.

That is outrageous.

Just 1% are supporting the other 99% ?!

No wonder this country is fucked.

I wonder what would happen if a minimum amount of CMS was introduced. If you're a parent you must pay £X amount. Paid to the receiving parent by the government and then the government is responsible for collecting it. Wonder how much better they would be at clamping down on loopholes, using the powers they could use but don't etc if the money was going to them instead.

People who have no money have no money.

And there are plenty of people who might say "Why should my taxes go towards covering the debts of feckless fathers ?".

I know this, because this was exactly what happened in the 80s when benefits to parents were stopped by the amount that the absent parent was supposed to pay.

I'll leave the more imaginative to guess how well that ended.

The parent 'not having money' doesn't make the kids cost less. At the moment if they don't pay the other parent has to struggle without. Sure arrears build up and may get paid later but not when needed.

If it was £200 a month minimum (still shit but I think its equivalent to what CMS would be for someone working full time minimum wage) then parent with the kids is paid £200 a month from the government as needed. If the other parent is deemed to only pay £7 a week then the rest can be a priority debt to the government that can accrue interest and be collected later - garnished from future earnings, tax rebates, inheritance etc. Government might close some loopholes and crack down if they are getting it for themselves. They have the power to take assets, prevent them from having a passport and all sorts - they just don't do it.

Your ex has a paid off house, lives there on benefits, works cash in hand, claims poverty but goes on 5 big holidays a year? Well not without their passport they won't be! Expecting a big future inheritance from rich parents that have been paying for their lifestyle? Well the government will be taking a big old chunk of that estate for arrears plus however many years of accruing interest. Poverty but brand new Audi? Repossessed to pay off arrears.

If someone is genuinely on benefits, then they can only pay a small amount. If they're fiddling, that's another issue.

It's the cash in hand that's the issue they don't know about it so can't take it into account. You could report him to HMRC

Is it still only £7 a week for absent parents on benefits? WTF

It was £7 a week 22 years ago when my oldest DD's father buggered off. It was widely considered to be a joke amount back then too.

Un-fucking-believable that it hasn't increased in that time!

We have this in Sweden, maintenance isn’t a percentage, but a calculation concerning the cost of the children, each adults living costs and each adults wage. Their is however a minimum amount, if the non-resident parent doesn’t pay the government pays and then recovers the money from the non-resident parent.

I wasn't talking about my ex - you may be talking to the OP ?

Nonetheless, the point stands. The principle of using the benefits system to pay for kids up front and then "somehow" recover the money from the absent parent in such a way to be economically neutral for the treasury. And the chances of that actually working are fuck all. (A good starting point is that no other country in the world has ever tried that.

I'm no spring chicken. And in my years I would take issue with the suggestion previously that somehow in the past there was more shame attached to deadbeat dads. On the occasions I've heard office chatter between guys on the matter it seems to be a perverse badge of honour how fathers can minimise their payments. It's quite sickening.

This isn't a defeatist post, in that I am saying there isn't a solution to the problem. It is a post that says that as a society we haven't been willing to actually make those changes.

As a thought, if 1% of the frothing, chatter and political effort that is currently being engineered about "small boats" went towards making deadbeat dads instead of refugees, then this thread wouldn't exist.

@SerendipityJane it appears Sweden uses a system similar to that suggested. Government pays the resident parent, then recovers it. See post by @Simonjt

That would mean resident parents can count on the contributions. If only we had people in power bright enough to recognise that there are deadbeat, non paying fathers who can afford a nice lifestyle whilst not supporting their children.