When child maintenance is paid, it can make a significant difference to the lives of families. But the complexity and constraints of the current child maintenance system have made it difficult to achieve these aims effectively.
The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission (The Commission) is a Non-Departmental Public Body that has been set up to take responsibility for the child maintenance system in Great Britain. The Commission's primary objective is to maximise the number of effective child maintenance arrangements in place - whether private or statutory - for children who live apart from one or both parents.
The Commission has responsibility for the statutory maintenance scheme (currently operated by the CSA) and will deliver the final year of the Operational Improvement Plan.
After the Operational Improvement Plan is complete, the Commission will continue to improve the two statutory schemes for the duration of their existence.
The wide ranging changes introduced by the Child Maintenance and Other Payments Act will deliver a simpler, more transparent and cost effective service. The changes include:
- extending the same options for arranging child maintenance to all parents by removing the requirement for those parents with day to day care claiming benefits to use the statutory scheme (implemented in October 2008)
- ensuring more money is delivered to lower income families, by extending and increasing the benefit disregard (implemented in October 2008)
- providing an information and support service- Child Maintenance Options, to enable parents to make an informed choice about whether private, statutory or court-based arrangements are most suited to their circumstances;
- tackling non-compliance and debt collections, through an enhanced enforcement regime and improvements in debt management;
- simplifying and streamlining assessments and improving the collection process for the statutory maintenance service.
In April 2010 a full disregard will be introduced meaning any money parents receive in child maintenance payments will not be taken into account when calculating out-of-work benefits or Housing and Council Tax benefits.
It is expected that the new system for calculating child maintenance will be introduced by the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission in 2011. All CSA clients will then be invited to apply to the new scheme or to make a private agreement. It is currently planned this process will take three years.
