Over the past 9 years the most persistent complaints I have had to deal with have been against the Child Support Agency (CSA). I really do despair for the one and a half million families trapped in what is now a complete shambles: 600,000 families on the new 'mark 2' system with a computer that cost hundreds of millions of pounds but which has ground to a halt so that cases are simply not processed at all or have to be dealt with manually. The remaining 900,000 families still languishing in the old system.
Originally the CSA was set up in 1992 with broad all party support replacing the courts. Always beware when politicians are all agreed, it generally should be taken as a sign that they have collectively taken leave of their senses. Also, if everyone agrees it usually means that the case will not be rigorously tested in argument and debate and the resulting legislation is insufficiently scrutinised.
I served on the standing committee which was responsible for line by line scrutiny of the CSA reform bill back in 1999 which set up the new reformed mark 2 system.The theory behind the new bill was that the system designed in 1992 attempted to be far too fair to the absent parent: when calculating that parent's liability any number of factors were taken into account. If any one of those factors changed then the amount they paid would have to be recalculated. So, as a result, the CSA was spending all its time and resources assessing and constantly reassessing how much absent parents should pay. Consequently they had insufficient time and resources to chase up those who refused to pay. The 1999 reform was designed to provide a much simpler assessment formula. It was supposed to sacrifice a measure of fairness for greater efficiency. This was to enable the agency to transfer its emphasis from assessment to enforcement.
Seven years and half a billion pounds of taxpayers money later things are worse than ever and the agency has been described as being in complete meltdown. It costs more to run than it collects in revenue. Much of this is down to the sheer incompetence of taking delivery of a computer system that simply did not do the job.
Just before Parliament rose for the Summer the Secretary of State came to announce what will be the third attempt to get things right. The headline was all about scrapping the CSA but underneath all the waffle about more consultation and more reports the reality is very different. The misery of the one and a half million families is not to be relieved by the scrapping of the agency and migrating them on to an efficient and fair system. On the contrary, they are to be left stranded exactly where they are now with the failing CSA. As usual it is all spin and mirrors: the CSA will be re branded and left with its difficult case load while the political spotlight will be shifted to a new body with low costs, no legacy and a carefully controlled inflow of suitable new cases.
What the Secretary of State did not tell Parliament was how the new Mark 3 CSA was going to be any better at making and enforcing assessments than the first two attempts. How and why will it be better. And what if anything is going to be done to help the one and a half million families stranded in CSA Mark 1 & 2 who have been writing to their MPs for years.
Of course it is not all down to government and incompetence. Much of the problem lies with ourselves. Two things never fail to surprise me. First, how parents who have shared a home and raised children can subsequently use those children as weapons of war in prosecuting a continuing vendetta against their former lover/ partner/ spouse. Second, the length some parents will go to in order to conceal their income so as to avoid paying for the upkeep of their children. I have had absent parents tell me quite brazenly that it would be quite improper for them to cough up what the CSA is asking because, after all, they have another family now, as if we should simply take it for granted that it is the responsibility of the taxpayer to pick up the tab for their first family. Whilst such attitudes prevail one can understand the enormity of the task facing the CSA. I suggest we really need to attach a much greater social stigma to absent parents who fail to make adequate financial provision for their children. After all, if you will not take care of your own then who are you?
With that proper social stigma we also need a much tougher set of sanctions to really make their life inconvenient and uncomfortable. |
