Great news for those who's exes don't pay maintenance

[Joysmum]

According to BBC news:

Parents who default on child maintenance payments face being turned down for mortgages and credit cards under new government plans

It's about time more action was taken against parents who don't pay towards the upkeep of their kids

CSA are reluctant to do ANYTHING frankly.

the idea that the same incompetent service will now be an incompetent service that takes a cut of children's maintenance is.... well. just wtf really - we don't give a fuck about actually making dad's pay for their children and we'll make that even clearer by charging women for the privilege of even trying to get money from absent fathers.

as far as i'm concerned it should be a legal matter akin to council tax or parking fines - re: if you don't pay it's straight to court and court judgments can be made and fees levied. it needs to be seen as a criminal offence not to pay maintenance for one's own children and be enforced properly by HMRC, DWP and the criminal system.

it reminds me of the history of trying to get DV taken seriously by the criminal justice system. it was seen as a 'private matter' for people to sort out themselves and still punching your wife isn't seen on a par with punching your boss or a person in the street.

somehow child maintenance is being seen in the same way - it's 'domestic', it's a private matter, it's his word against hers, they should sort it out themselves etc.

how do you make a private arrangement with someone who has never seen their child and you don't have a contact number or address for? if it is them obstructing any chance of sorting it out 'privately' why should you be the one to pay for it?

this issue really makes me sick to be honest -it's a flagrantly misogynistic move that will penalise women and children.

I pay a £1000 PM to my ex for my 2 children being self employed this is possible too little when business is good and too much when business is bad. The ex has tried to get the CSA involved a couple of times but I refuse to the point of going to prison to even talk to them. I would go bankrupt and fold the business before ever using the CSA.

why andy?

My XH pays £50 a week on around £25K self employed income, He tells me that he is being far too generous and HE threatened to go to the CSA. When I told him that according to the CSA website he should be paying me £57 a week, he shut up.....

Seriously, who begrudges paying £50 a week for their child's upkeep?

If he stops paying at any point, I will involve the CSA but would rather not at the moment.

I hope that the Government do see these laws through and that they are used. There are men out there who can afford to pay buy don't so something needs to be done to make them pay up.

How are they even going to enforce this when they cant even find someone who is working and paying taxes through the inland revenue.

It is absolutely ridiculous that I will have to pay so that my exh provides for his child.

There should be more stigma put on parents who don't pay for their children. Instead the stigma is on the lone parent who is actually looking after and providing for the child.

It's bullshit, it won't happen. There's an election coming so take everything you hear from them between now and the election with a huge pinch of salt.

And how would they know if someone is defaulting if there is a private arrangement? The only way to get this registered in some way is to put it with CSA and pay their fees. I just can't see that this will ever happen.

I would go bankrupt and fold the business before ever using the CSA.

So you would bankrupt yourself, meaning your own child/ren went without things they need/want, why would anybody do that?

Because by the time the CSA have actually done anything, you'd be bankrupt anyway.

Fakename, the poster just ment that as how bloody pointless the CSA are and that any alternative is better than getting them involved as they are usually, a waste of time and money for the people who need them most.

I won't bother with them either.

Having listened to the radio on the way home the other night, and the debate around this proposal, it makes me wonder how long it would take before people whose credit rating was adversely affected by non-payment via the CSA, take on the Government as a breach of their Hoooooooman Rights, contravention of the Data Protection Act (because it would involve sharing the data between Government and Credit Ratings Agencies) etc etc ad nauseum.

Presumably this would need an adjustment to the Law, which would need to be run through the House of Lords, House of Commons etc etc ad nauseum.

I guess the devil is in the detail with these things .....

I expect it could be in place by the time my DSS has grandchildren .... oh joy

Possibly rather cynical of me, but as long as it is a majority of men in the government, then this is seen as a "woman's issue" right up there with scrounging single mums and childcare issues. And that means they think it's unimportant - they just toss a few bones in the direction of women in the lead up to elections in an effort to gain votes. Nothing solid, mind you, that they'd have to actually follow through on...

and also whilst it is in those men's interest to encourage women to stay in marriages/cohabiting relationships they're unlikely to support genuine changes to child maintenance and childcare.