Government decides to make single parents lives more difficult

[Daddster]

The Government has announced a "name and shame" and other sanctions for absent parents who don't pay their maintenance (see link.

It is just me or are they really trying to make relationships which are already strained beyond breaking point and which already usually have a detrimental effect on the kids much much worse? As usual, the fallout will be on the kid, whom the non-paying parent will resent.

There was a peer on Radio 4 over the past few days quite rightly refusing a Conservative peer's suggestion that access to one's child be made conditional on payment of maintenance (you'd be punishing the wrong person), but this new suggestion is sort of doing the same thing.

Crikey Twinset - I didn't know it could change that much. Isn't it somthing like 15% for the first child and they take 15% off the NRP's earnings before making the assessment when they have a child living with them? I'd get that checked if I were you? It didn't make anything like that difference for us.

I don't want the money as I donlt need it and he has fallen on hard times and no matter whatI think about whether he should have had the baby I donlt want that baby to go without anything.

It was incompetence, mistakes and inflexibility Twinset.

THat sounds exactly like the csa to me, they could use that as their slogan.

SO IF my ex dp has another baby with his current or future girlfriend will his maintenance for our son go down?

Jellyjelly, copied this from their website

"We can then adjust the child maintenance based on:

• how many other children are living with the non-resident parent, who they or their partner get Child Benefit for (a regular payment made to anyone bringing up children)
• how many children the non-resident parent needs to pay child maintenance for
• whether the child stays with the non-resident parent at least one night each week."

i don't see how naming and shaming them will make a difference. how many people are actually going to look on this website? what exactly will it do? i should imagine anyone that already knows the father knows if they don't or do pay maintenance.

a kind of 'pay as you sow'

I have to say I agree 100% with all of twinset's posts.

Until fathers have equal rights to parent their children, it is unlikely that they will feel equal responsibility to maintain them. Of course there are always exceptions to the average example, but in general a parent (usually the father in the uk) who does not have an equal say in the raising of their child, is unlikely to have the same vested interest in the well-being of that child.

I'm sure that you have all heard my stories ad nauseum about dh's ex who has gone out of her way to exclude him from any meaningful contribution to the upbringing of his children with her. But then quite happily calls him screaming and yelling that the kids need more money for new trainers and candy and a new motorcycle (this was for a 5 year old). If it had been up to dh, the 5 year old would not be eating candy instead of a nutritional meal, wouldn't be allowed to ride, much less own a motorcyle and would get new trainers when he needed them, not every two weeks when they got dirty. Offers of money for extra tutoring and/or private school were rejected.

Anyway, story goes on and on, but at some point, dh who is a wonderful dedicated father to his other children (another one by a previous relationship and 2 with me), just gave up.

What the money is spent on is none of the other persons business imo. My X gives nothing and hasnt for years watching as we nearly lost the house and couldnt afford basics. He agreed to pay me via the CSA and has never honoured that agreement. He lies and cheats and insists on contact and also that when they come over they have to bring clothing, games, toys etc.

The CSA do not seem able to apply rules which every tax office in this country can. It seems to me that only a couple of rules should apply and I think a link to contact is dodgy however annoying it is. Certainly someone who doesnt pay should not be able to bleat on about their parental rights when they are completely incapable of taking responsbility.

And someone who completely flouts all agreements regarding parental rights shouldn't bleat on about the responsiblities of the parent that they are cheating out of a healthy relationship with their child.

If the money is spent on things that are patently dangerous or illegal then the parent should have a say in what it's spent on. Otherwise, I agree. But if a parent is voluntarily making the recommended payments per csa, and other parent is spending money on cigarettes and drugs and then complaining that she has no money to feed the children (despite getting benefits and not declaring volutary maintenance), then maybe paying parent is not unreasonable in refusing to pay more and getting irritated by the constant demands.

Bring on any punishment -- as harsh as needed - to reign in deadbeat Dads (and Mums). The OP said these new measures will harm the children. I think that non payment is harming them more.

Sofia, your DH's XW is a shocking creature. HE obviously should have a say in his children's lives. Very sad. :-(

Can't you get them come stay in LA for a while and show them what a nice normal family is like?

My xp pays up regularly every month (albeit via the CSA) so I'm actually quite concerned that he'll be surcharged on top of his maintenance payments when he's kept to his side of the agreement. This move will do nothing for interfamily relations and I for one would not give consent for him to be named/shamed even if he wasn't paying. I have to consider my dd - imagine the mocking she'd get at school from some thoughtless children if she were to be identified as having a feckless father (not to mention sparing my blushes at my poor life choices ). The £10 surcharge is to hide the millions that the CSA has already lost through it's own incompetence. Count me out!!

thanks Eleusis, unfortunately the kids are now teenagers, truly awful and I wouldn't have them anywhere near my children. The sd went to visit some of dh's family and stole money and clothes from them. Both kids have been in trouble with the police and neither goes to school regularly despite both still being school age. Both smoke, drink and have sex regularly.

I do think deadbeat parents should be forced to pay, but naming and shaming is just pathetic. If the scorn of their own children is not going to make them pay, will the opinion of the csa and the other mistreated parents (who will be the only ones checking the list) make any difference at all. Here in the USA in many States, it is fairly easy to get paychecks garnished for nonpayment and if the nonpayment continues the drivers license is suspended. However, fathers truly do have for the most part equal rights to parent their children and have custody of them. Virtually everyone I know here who is divorced has equal custody of the children who go back and forth between the two households. It takes a little adjustment (generally a year), but in the end seems to be much more stable and nurturing for the children (particularly young ones).

my ex had another baby with his gf when he left us, my childrens' maintenance dropped because he reserved money for his subsequent family. frankly i couldn't give a shit if the new baby went without things, my children are my responsibility, the new baby isn't my responsibility at all, but I'm the one that has to cut corners and explain why we can't have things.

I think this proposal is disgraceful actually.

My ex currently pays a fiver a week for both children (ie £2.50 each) - at least, come to think of it, I think he does, I can't remember seeing any confirmation that any maintenance has gone in recently, must check bank account. But it took 4 years to get that happening and as soon as he stops working, it stops. Job-hopping is an extremely effective way of ensuring the CSA don't catch up with you.

I dread to think how humiliating it would be for my children to find his face on a naming and shaming web site. He wouldn't care, but they would be terribly hurt and embarrassed. And if any of their schoolmates decided to look him up, they could be thoroughly humiliated in the playground. Great. Really in their interests, I don't think.

What do we do with people who don't pay their income tax? Do we put their mugshots on a website? No, we do an IR investigation where they are considered guilty unless they can convince the taxman otherwise. What do we do with people who defraud the benefit system? We cut off their benefit and prosecute them. What do we do with people who don't pay their council tax? We prosecute them and send the bailifs round.

And for maintenance? A fucking website to humiliate our children. No effective sanctions, no money. A photo doesn't help me, the money does. Public opprobrium isn't of interest to me, the money is. This is just one more pathetic demonstration of how the payment of maintenance is simply not taken seriously. If we approached it the way we approach all our other obligations like Council Tax and Income Tax, most absent parents would pay it, just as most people pay their tax. You'll always get a few deadbeats who don't, just as there are always a few duffers who don't pay their tax; but it wouldn't be the persistent ongoing problem it is now. This proposal just continues the tradition of sending out the message loud and clear: maintenance is something you pay if you feel like it. Disgraceful.

I do think the UK lets absent parents off very easily, FWIW, w/regards to maintenance.

There seems to be this pervasive idea that when a father leaves the home, it's the state's repsonsibility to pick up the slack.

I know someone who has out of the blue suddenly got money from the CSA after waiting 10 years for her ex to pay anything. He's obviously started working and they found him and are deducting it. It does happen, and he has to pay arrears from all the years he's been avoiding it!

Maybe we should hand over responsibility for collecting maintenance to the Inland Revenue? They have the power to go after people who aren't paying their fair share WRT taxes, maybe they'd actually manage to collect maintenance too.

I don't agree with non-resident parents who think 'I don't get the access I'd like, I'll stop paying'. The children still need feeding and housing. Selfish and wrong, wrong, wrong, to punish the children for disputes with your ex.

'Selfish and wrong, wrong, wrong, to punish the children for disputes with your ex. '

that does go bothe ways of course, selfish to with-hold maintenance and selfish to withhold contact, unless there are legitimate reasons. i guess there isn't just financial poverty, but parenting poverty as well when a child is used to make a point.

mind you, I've bent over backwards sometimes to maintain my childrens contact with their dad, and i haven't seen a penny in three years. it gets very VERY wearing after a while, trying to bring up three children on one under average wage.

I bet it does Persephone. My father did his best to avoid the pathetic amount of maintenance the court had awarded so I do object to non-resident parents who wriggle out of their responsibility. (The selfish git also stopped paying when we were 16 despite still being in education.) Strangely he's turned into quite a good father and quite generous, since we grew up. Think being the resident parent for my half sister sorted him out but clearly it's not a solution for everyone!

Persephone - that is a terrible thing to say. Last time I looked all children were created equal.

And perhaps someone could explain to me why, under the new rules, DH's ex is entitled to a percentage of the Child Tax Credit that I receive for my son!