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Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill

moved Amendment No. 18: 18: Clause 19, page 9, line 2, at beginning insert ““Subject to subsections (2) and (3),”” The noble Lord said: My Lords, Amendments Nos. 18 and 19 stand in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Addington. They give the House a chance to look at a practical proposal to introduce the notion of a debt management plan for existing CSA cases. As noble Lords know, the purport of the Bill is that between 2010 and 2013 there will come a date for all parents with an existing child support case when liability for child maintenance under the existing assessment or calculation will end. On that date, depending on the choices they make, they will either move to the third child support scheme which we are proposing in the Bill, move to their own voluntary agreed arrangements or opt for a continuation of their current arrangements under the new cash transfer service. So much is known; so far, so good. This amendment simply seeks to use that important date when liability under the existing scheme ceases to require that both parents should receive a full and final statement from the commission showing the amount of any outstanding child maintenance liability, including amounts owed to the parent with care and to the Secretary of State. The amendment proposes that, alongside that full and final statement, the commission should in each case prepare a personal debt recovery and debt management plan in respect of any child maintenance arrears, which it should then proceed to apply. If the amendment were accepted it would allow the drafting of regulations that would in turn provide a warning for future debt recovery action which would be of use to non-resident parents. It would also give parents with care the confidence that they would have a clear timetable for the steps that the commission proposes to take to implement the recovery and debt management strategy adopted in each and every case and indeed the intervals when the commission will report to the parent with care on the outcome of those steps. I do not think it too severe to say that debt collection has not previously been a high priority in the Child Support Agency’s list of things to do. The result is that debts have been allowed to build up over long periods. We know that because we had long discussions about it in Grand Committee. The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission will inherit about £3.7 billion in formal child support debt. However, we are realistic enough to recognise that only a proportion of that, some £1.5 billion, is regarded as effectively collectable. Between 2008 and 2010 the new commission will have had two years to get to grips with its new enforcement powers, which will be useful and we hope will produce a new regime that will be more effective at reducing and writing off debts in the circumstances that will obtain in future. So by 2010 the commission should be in a position to know what debts can or cannot realistically be recovered. At that point it should impart that information on a case-by-case basis to the parents with care. That will enable parents to know precisely where they stand and when their CSA liability ceases. Arguably, at that point, the commission owes it to parents with care to tell them exactly what they can realistically expect it to recover in future. I said earlier that the Child Support Agency’s rate of debt collection was barely keeping pace with the rate at which new debts and arrears were accruing. It would help to understand some of the background to this amendment if the Minister could answer the following point, if not today then by note at some future date. I noticed a Parliamentary Question from Mr Danny Alexander, dated 19 February 2008, which said that at the end of November 2007 the Child Support Agency had 1,056,500 cases with remaining outstanding debt. An estimated 53 per cent of that total debt is due to the Secretary of State and 47 per cent to parents with care. On Report the Minister helpfully said that, at the last count, internal CSA figures show that arrears grew at about £10 million a month during 2007-08. If I am reading those figures right, that means that, given the £126 million collected in arrears during that same year that we know about, the CSA may just be beginning to eat into the historic debt mountain. If that is the case, it would be good to know that. The House will know that the operational improvement plan was set to collect £213 million in historic debt by 2009, £100 million of it via private debt collectors. That is probably an optimistic figure in retrospect, but it would be good to know, if not tonight then some time between now and Report, how the operational improvement plan was faring with regard to its target. The amendment is practical and does not involve any great principle. The Minister may say that it is all going to be done anyway, but having it in the Bill would give parents with care some confidence; it would certainly do that for me. We will listen with interest to what the Minister says in response. I beg to move.