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Select Committee · Work and Pensions Committee

Children in poverty: Child Maintenance Service

Status: Closed Opened: 18 May 2022 Closed: 31 Oct 2023 16 recommendations 15 conclusions 1 report

Children in poverty: Child Maintenance Service is the third and final part of the Committee’s wider inquiry into children in poverty, following on from the Measurement and targets , and no recourse to public funds . The Committee looked into: How many children in the UK live in separated families? What proportion of these children …

Clear

Reports

1 report
Title HC No. Published Items Response
Sixth Report - Children in poverty: Child Maintenance Servi… HC 272 27 Apr 2023 31 Responded

Recommendations & Conclusions

3 items
8 Recommendation Sixth Report - Children in poverty: Chi… Deferred

Confirm plans for implementing partial child maintenance deductions in Universal Credit and their priority.

Competing priorities for the Universal Credit system, specifically work on fraud and error and the automation of processes to allow the expansion of the move to Universal Credit, mean the Department has not undertaken work to implement capability in the system to process partial deductions for child maintenance in the …

Government response. The government acknowledges that legislative changes would be needed for partial deductions but states there are no estimated timescales due to current Universal Credit system work focusing on fraud, error, and migration.
Department for Work and Pensions
9 Recommendation Sixth Report - Children in poverty: Chi… Deferred

Seek legislative authority to process partial Universal Credit deductions for child maintenance arrears.

The Department should seek, as part of any future legislative change in the Child Maintenance Service system, the authority to process partial deductions from Universal Credit for child maintenance arrears.

Government response. The government commits to amending legislation for partial deductions when it can be implemented but states there are no estimated timescales as Universal Credit development is currently focused on other priorities.
Department for Work and Pensions
13 Recommendation Sixth Report - Children in poverty: Chi… Deferred

Produce an analysis of reasons for increased families lacking child maintenance arrangements.

The proportion of families with private arrangements has increased since the 2012 reforms but this has also been accompanied by an increase in the number of families without an arrangement. There is evidence that a significant number of Children in poverty: Child Maintenance Service 47 parents who do not have …

Government response. The government stated it has not conducted specific research into the increase in families without child maintenance arrangements, although it monitors this annually and has general research on separated families. It listed reasons why some parents don't want arrangements and …
Department for Work and Pensions

Oral evidence sessions

4 sessions
Date Witnesses
18 Jan 2023 Arlene Sugden · Department for Work and Pensions, Hilda Massey · Department for Work and Pensions, Viscount Younger of Leckie · Department for Work and Pensions View ↗
2 Nov 2022 Joshua Reddaway · National Audit Office View ↗
19 Oct 2022 Dr Christine Davies · Royal Holloway University of London, Dr Jon Symonds · University of Bristol, Dr Mia Hakovirta · Turku University, Finland, Professor Esther Dermott · University of Bristol View ↗
7 Sep 2022 Caitlin Logan · One Parent Families Scotland, Cristina Odone · Centre for Social Justice, Meghan Meek-O’Connor · Save the Children, Michael Lewkowicz · Families Need Fathers, Victoria Benson · Gingerbread View ↗

Correspondence

4 letters
DateDirectionTitle
6 Sep 2023 — Correspondence with the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State relating to Chil…
13 Jul 2023 — Correspondence with Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State relating to Children…
23 Feb 2023 — Correspondence with the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State relating to Chil…
1 Feb 2023 — Correspondence with the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State about the Childr…