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  • Jerome Mayhew – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    Jerome Mayhew – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    The speech made by Jerome Mayhew, the Conservative MP for Broadland, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    I aim to be as brief as my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Holly Mumby-Croft). I want to put on record my support for this Bill. Often in Friday sittings we talk about photogenic furry animals, but this is very different. This is an important Bill that will affect us all. To take the example of just one disease, it is estimated by Alzheimer’s Research UK that there are 944,000 people in this country suffering from dementia. The estimate is that one in three children born this year will develop and suffer from dementia in the future. This is an issue that affects us all now or will do in the future.

    I want to highlight the importance of lasting powers of attorney and point out that there are not one but two different types. There are the ones that affect property and affairs and there are, crucially, the ones that affect welfare and health. From personal experience as an attorney in this area, I found the current system surprisingly complex, and that was as a qualified barrister. To be using only paper is surprising in this day and age. The complexity of sequential signatures was also surprising, and the identity checks relying on witnesses are frankly inadequate in modern times. I welcome the intention of the Bill, which is to make it easier to create LPAs, using digital facilities where appropriate. I recognise that about 25% of those over 65 do not have easy access to the internet, although on many occasions it will be younger family members whom they will be appointing as attorneys, and in those circumstances many of that 25% will be given assistance to use digital access as well. However, it is important that a paper alternative continues to be provided, and I am glad that is recognised in the Bill.

    My final point is that it is great that the Bill contains increased protections from abuse, particularly in paragraph 7(2) of schedule 1, which makes reference to the process for objecting to registration for third parties. That is a useful addition, and I thoroughly welcome this Bill.

  • Holly Mumby-Croft – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    Holly Mumby-Croft – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    The speech made by Holly Mumby-Croft, the Conservative MP for Scunthorpe, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock (Stephen Metcalfe) for bringing forward this private Member’s Bill. If I may, Madam Deputy Speaker, I would also like to thank you, as the right hon. Member for Doncaster Central (Dame Rosie Winterton). I carried out some research before I came today, as I have worked on lasting powers of attorney in a previous life, and I note that you have done an awful lot of work in the background on this subject. I want to put on record my thanks for that work and what that has brought about today.

    I wholeheartedly support this private Member’s Bill. I absolutely understand and have seen first hand the need for the measures in it. I would like to put on record my thanks on behalf of this side of the House. I wish my hon. Friend well with his Bill.

  • Alex Cunningham – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    Alex Cunningham – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    The speech made by Alex Cunningham, the Labour MP for Stockton North, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    I congratulate the hon. Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock (Stephen Metcalfe) on promoting this private Member’s Bill and on introducing it today. He made his case very well; this is a matter of great importance that can affect so many of us.

    Last year, I wrote to the then Justice Minister overseeing this portfolio, the hon. and learned Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk). I had several concerns, particularly regarding the lack of training and awareness on the limits of power of attorney, that had been brought to my attention by a number of practitioners. The then Minister’s response was reassuring and I am glad that the agenda in this area is moving forward with Government support, but there is still much to be done to improve the system beyond the Bill’s parameters. That said, Labour supports the Bill’s aims and welcomes the modernisation of the process for making and registering lasting powers of attorney.

    It is of cardinal importance that donors are protected. If technology can provide more effective ways of strengthening those protections, we should make full use of it. Furthermore, although I understand that the strain on the Office of the Public Guardian has reduced in recent times with the recruitment of more caseworkers, the staff there are still stretched and delays are still being experienced. I hope that the modernisation process provides the necessary streamlining to ease the burden on the Office of the Public Guardian.

    We welcome the Bill’s amendment to section 3 of the Powers of Attorney Act 1971, which the hon. Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock mentioned, which will enable chartered legal executives to certify copies of powers of attorney. It is good to see that particular matter addressed. However, there are several areas on which I would welcome the thoughts of the hon. Member or the Minister to inform my understanding of why they have been omitted from the Bill. One notable absence from the Government’s response to the consultation was the Law Society’s recommendation that certification should expressly include consideration of the donor’s capacity. This seems like a sensible proposal to me, and I am interested to hear why the Bill has not taken it on.

    While LPAs are one important mechanism by which it is possible to support the exercise of legal capacity, as Alex Ruck Keene KC notes in an article on his excellent website about mental capacity law and policy, it is certainly not the only mechanism. He notes that it would be possible within the same zone of endeavour as this Bill

    “to flesh out the provisions of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 to secure that a person is recognised as being able to make their own decisions in more situations than is currently the case.”

    Should we expect further legislation that would provide for wider reforms, or is this Bill the extent of the Government’s ambition for legislative work in this area? I ask with genuine interest, as we are looking forward to working with the Government, and the hon. Member, on introducing reforms in this important area.

    I was pleased to read in the Minister’s foreword to the consultation response that

    “it remains for me to emphasise again the importance of us modernising LPAs in a way that is right for donors. They are the ones who choose their attorneys, they are the ones that should set the scope of the powers they wish to confer under an LPA, and they are the ones whose rights and freedoms must be protected and facilitated through this service. It therefore remains the case that their needs are paramount and must come before those of any other party as we seek to make changes.”

    We very much agree with this sentiment and are looking forward to scrutinising and potentially improving these measures at Committee stage.

  • Stephen Metcalfe – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    Stephen Metcalfe – 2022 Speech on the Power of Attorney Bill

    The speech made by Stephen Metcalfe, the Conservative MP for South Basildon and East Thurrock, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    I beg to move that, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

    Powers of attorney are important legal arrangements that allow people to appoint others—the donees of the power, known as attorneys—to act on their behalf. The powers normally relate to financial matters, and the attorney must act on instructions from the donor of the power—the person who made it.

    Lasting powers of attorney, or LPAs, are a specific type of power of attorney with even wider scope. Such arrangements allow someone to appoint another to act on their behalf after the donor has lost the mental capacity to make their own decisions and give instructions. LPAs can apply to not just financial decisions but health and welfare decisions too.

    Powers of attorney generally, and lasting powers of attorney specifically, are incredibly powerful and useful appointments. They allow people to retain control over aspects of their lives, in circumstances where they might not otherwise be able to make decisions or take actions. LPAs, in particular, ensure that people have the opportunity to make provision for a future where they may no longer have the mental capacity to understand what is happening to them and therefore to make decisions about the things they care about.

    With the prevalence of dementia increasing and our population ageing, these documents will become ever more important in ensuring that people can continue to live the lives they want to. They will be even more important in protecting people who might otherwise be the target of fraud, scams and abuse. I have seen that in my constituency and on a personal level. These are powerful documents, and they need to be used carefully.

    Lasting powers of attorney are part of the toolkit to ensure that people can live the lives they want to. That is why I am delighted to bring forward this Bill in my name. It delivers two important changes to legislation around powers of attorney. First, it will reform the process of making and registering a lasting power of attorney to make it safer, easier and more sustainable. Secondly, it will widen the group of people who can provide certified copies of powers of attorney to include chartered legal executives.

    Before I get into the detail of this Bill, I will set out the history of these documents and the problems that have arisen as a result. Under the Power of Attorney Act 1971, the power of attorney is a formal appointment whereby one party, the donor, gives another party, the attorney or donee, the power to act on their behalf and in their name. Power of attorney, in contrast to appointing an agent, can only be created and valid where certain legal formalities are observed, and they must be granted by deed. The ordinary or general power of attorney is for when the donor only needs help temporarily, for example when people are in hospital or abroad and need help with everyday tasks such as paying bills.

    Ordinary powers of attorney are common in the commercial world, where they may be used in a number of ways, most typically to enable another person to execute documents on the donor’s behalf or in a transactional context. Another use is in appointing a power of attorney to manage financial or property matters in a donor’s absence. However, there were issues with these powers of attorney, as the power ceases to have effect when the donor lost mental capacity to make decisions and give instructions. As the Law Commission pointed out in 1983:

    “at a time when the assistance of the attorney has become for the donor not merely desirable but essential, the attorney has no authority to act.”

    This resulted in the introduction of the Enduring Powers of Attorney Act 1986. As the name suggests, enduring powers of attorney endure past the loss of mental capacity, allowing an attorney to continue acting on a donor’s behalf. Individuals concerned about their ability to control their own lives in future could now ensure that the people making those decisions were the people they had chosen and that they trusted.

    Peter Gibson (Darlington) (Con)

    My hon. Friend is making an important speech and highlighting the legislation that brings us to today and his important Bill. I just put on record the importance of those enduring powers of attorney that predate the current lasting powers of attorney and to highlight to the House the necessity for people to register them when capacity is lost. Many mistakenly believe, where an enduring power of attorney is in place, that there are no steps to take in order for it to be used.

    Stephen Metcalfe

    I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his clarification. Obviously, he knows considerably more about the history of this than I have perhaps been able to gain during my research. In the 1990s, there were greater concerns about the abuse of enduring powers of attorney. I am told there was concern that between 10% and 20% of enduring powers of attorney were potentially being used in an abusive way. To resolve that, and following extensive work by the Law Commission, the Mental Capacity Act was passed in 2005. Enduring power of attorney was replaced by lasting power of attorney, or LPA, in 2007.

    New safeguards were introduced—primarily the requirement for the LPA to be registered by and with the new Public Guardian and their office, the Office of the Public Guardian, before it could be used, whether before or after a loss of capacity; and the role of the certificate provider, who must confirm that the donor understands their LPA and that there was no fraud or undue pressure.

    Fifteen years on, the system is in need of an update. The Government’s 2021 consultation on modernisation clearly set out the issues, and media coverage over the past year has further emphasised the need for reform. First, people wishing to make LPAs struggle to understand the system and to complete their LPA accurately. Guidance can be overwhelming and full of jargon such as “donor”, “attorney”, “certificate provider”, “execution” and “jointly and severally”. This is specifically daunting in urgent circumstances—for instance, due to a recent diagnosis of dementia or terminal illness.

    The reliance on paper also makes it more complicated than necessary. The legislative framework and operational process involved mean that, even where the LPA is filled in online, each LPA has to be printed off and signed on paper in five places in a specific order by at least three people to be valid. The possibility for error to creep in is high, and the Office of the Public Guardian indicates that as many as 11% of LPAs sent to the OPG cannot be registered because of signing mistakes. Donors cannot understand why the LPA process does not make use of technological improvements since 2007. They want to use a digital system to fill in, sign and submit documents. As the Government set out in their consultation, that would allow a speedier process, reduce the administrative burden on people and help to reduce or even remove many of the errors in the process.

    Secondly, the OPG is drowning in paperwork, and that does not allow the OPG to deliver the service that its fee payers expect. Many in this place will know about the media reports on the backlog in registrations. The OPG reports that it is taking up to 20 weeks on average to process an LPA application, against its target of eight weeks. Others will be receiving letters from constituents asking for assistance, as they are left unable to support their loved ones because an LPA is currently sitting in that backlog.

    We all agree that this situation is unsustainable. The OPG carries out manual administration checks. It stores 11 tonnes of paper at any one time, and LPA applications are generally increasing, with the number of LPAs submitted for registration more than doubling between 2014-15 and 2019-20. That is creating an ever increasing need for staff, equipment and storage space. The ability to use a digital channel—alongside, I stress, a paper route—to make and register an LPA would help to resolve some of those issues. Most of the current manual checks could be automated. Physical storage requirements could be reduced and, critically, it would increase the OPA’s resilience to backlogs caused by the disruption of paper processing.

    The third point, and probably the most important one, is that while a digital channel is desirable for donors, attorneys and the OPG, it must be balanced against the need for suitable safeguards. The risk of fraud is small, but it is a real risk. The BBC Radio 4 programme “You and Yours” reported last year on the case of Marie—not her real name—who was a victim of LPA fraud when someone took out an LPA in her name and attempted to sell her home. Concerns about undue pressure and abuse are also common. Earlier this year, in parallel with another report by “You and Yours”, a debate was held in the other place on LPAs and the economic abuse of older people.

    I firmly believe that LPAs are a positive way for people to control what happens if they lose mental capacity. They are an insurance policy that people should take out to appoint people they trust to make decisions in their best interests, should the worst happen. But I cannot ignore that there must be protections in the system to reduce the chance of it being manipulated by those who intend ill will towards others.

    James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con)

    I am not a lawyer—heaven forbid!—but my understanding of the Bill is that it will do a number of really important things. It will provide much better safeguards on financial and property issues, and it will provide safeguards where there is loss of mental capacity and against abuses of power. It will also make the process a bit more streamlined, as we will not be so dependent on expensive lawyers now that legal executives can do this. My question for my hon. Friend is, will it be any cheaper?

    Stephen Metcalfe

    My hon. Friend asks a very good question. Although I cannot guarantee it will be cheaper, I can say that it will be no more expensive. We need to make the system sustainable and the relatively straightforward reforms in my Bill will allow that to happen, while keeping the price competitive, as it is at the moment.

    My hon. Friend has hit upon the point at which I am going to describe some of the detail of the Bill and how it resolves some of the issues to which I have alluded. It makes a number of changes to the Mental Capacity Act 2005, specifically to schedule 1, which covers provision for the making and registration of LPAs. The most crucial change is that the Public Guardian will verify the identity of certain parties as part of the registration. It is important to strengthen safeguards in that way on a document that can confer such wide powers on access to savings, investment and property. The Government’s consultation indicated that these proposals were well received by respondents, including the public, as a necessary safeguard. This will be a key protection against the horrible position Marie found herself in, by increasing confidence that the people named in the LPA have actually been involved in the process of making it. This provision is even more important now, with identity fraud on the rise and perpetrators making use of ever-more sophisticated methods for targeting their victims. Removing loopholes in the system before they can become further exploited and other members of the public are put at risk is one reason I chose to take this Bill through Parliament.

    The second main change is on the requirement for the application to register, requiring the donor to apply and changing what must accompany the application—currently, the instrument intended to create the LPA and the fee. This will facilitate a flexible system, so that instead of just a paper channel or a digital channel, each actor, whether they are the donor, the attorney or the certificate provider, can use the method that best suits their needs to complete a single LPA. This will reduce the administrative burden on donors and attorneys, while automated and early error checking will help to reduce the potential for signing and other errors that prevent registration.

    Changes to the notification system will also facilitate this flexibility. The system requires that people the donor named in the LPA are informed by the applicant when the LPA is sent for registration, so that they can raise any objections. In the future, the Public Guardian will send these notifications. This change is made for three reasons. First, the Public Guardian can be certain that the notifications have been sent, increasing the protection provided. Secondly, it removes the administrative burden from the donor. Thirdly, the Public Guardian will be co-ordinating the execution of the document, so is best placed to send these in a timely manner.

    That links to changes to the process for objecting to the registration of an LPA. The current process is complex, with different routes for different people, depending on the type of objection. People and organisations not named in the LPA do not even have a formal route to raise objections. That group currently includes organisations such as local authorities, which have a statutory safeguarding duty but no formal way of raising related concerns about an LPA’s registration with the Public Guardian. Although the Public Guardian currently processes these objections, because it is the sensible thing to do and offers the best protection for the donor, the scope of the current legislation is limited and creates ambiguity. To rectify this issue, the Bill introduces a single route for all objections, starting with the Public Guardian and ending at the Court of Protection, if that is required. It applies to all individuals and organisations, even if they are not included in the original LPA. So there is more clarity about where and how to raise concerns about the registration.

    Let me turn to increased protection for donors. Finally, to modernise LPAs the Bill changes the evidence of registration of the LPA. As I said, LPAs are currently paper documents. That means that if there are changes—for instance, if an attorney is removed because of abuse—the Public Guardian needs to amend the paper documents. As I am sure the House can imagine, why would someone who has been removed from an LPA because of abuse want to return it to the Office of the Public Guardian? The LPA will therefore be registered as an electronic document. That will create a single source of truth that can be accessed in real time by third parties, but more importantly, updated in real time by the Public Guardian without requiring the paper to be returned.

    I recognise, however, that some individuals and third parties will remain unable to use an electronic system. For that reason, the Bill also provides for other methods of physical proof. I believe that those will be set out further in regulations.

    As I stated, my Bill seeks not only to modernise LPAs, but to amend section 3 of the Powers of Attorney Act 1971 to enable chartered legal executives to certify copies of a power of attorney. That Act sets out how a copy of a power of attorney can be made and who can certify or sign copies, stipulating that only

    “the donor of the power…a solicitor, authorised person or stockbroker”

    can sign or certify

    “that the copy is a true and complete copy of the original”.

    The Bill seeks to include chartered legal executives among those who can certify a copy of a power of attorney.

    We have come a long way since 1971; it is more than half a century since that Act came into force. Chartered legal executives are allowed to provide legal services under the Legal Services Act 2007 and now provide many of the same legal services as solicitors. It is therefore completely right that chartered legal executives have the ability to certify copies.

    I am conscious of time, so I will draw my remarks to a close. I have outlined a number of specific changes that the Bill will make. It is a relatively straightforward piece of legislation, but is important none the less. It will make the Office of the Public Guardian more sustainable; streamline the process; increase the number of people who can authorise copies of lasting powers of attorney; and introduce some important safety checks. I very much look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say. I thank him and his Department for working with me to bring the Bill to this stage and I hope that, after today’s debate, we can take it further forward. I commend the Bill to the House.

  • Mims Davies – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    Mims Davies – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    The speech made by Mims Davies, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    It is an honour to speak in this debate, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie) for introducing the Bill and raising this important issue. I am pleased to confirm that the Government intend to support the Bill.

    I was going to start by providing a brief background on the purpose of the CMS, but many Members have done a brilliant job on that so I will instead turn to the context of the Bill, making a couple of points and answering some questions, of course. I also want to pay tribute to all the DWP teams that work tirelessly in this space delivering the CMS service so diligently. As a constituency MP and a friend to many single parents, I have seen cases where help from former partners is needed to support children; making sure positive arrangements are in place is crucial to youngsters in every constituency.

    I must declare an interest as a single mum. I know personally how important it is for children to know, where possible, that they have the support of both parents, both financially and emotionally. I thank the Gingerbread charity for its advocacy work. I concur with many of the points made today. Our Minister in the other place, Baroness Stedman-Scott, who has day-to-day responsibility for the policy, is strident in her support for reducing parent conflict and making sure that children get the backing that they need and deserve from both parents. We are determined to ensure that the CMS process improves.

    I thank all hon. Members who have contributed, including my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans), who raised the CMS process and the other private Member’s Bill, the Child Support Collection (Domestic Abuse) Bill, which will be in Committee very shortly. I am delighted to have his support. There were thoughtful contributions from my hon. Friends the Members for Newbury (Laura Farris), for Darlington (Peter Gibson) and for Bracknell (James Sunderland). My hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) rightly paid great tribute to MPs’ caseworkers, who deal with the challenges and manage both sides of this issue day in, day out. We are grateful to them. On the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Broadland (Jerome Mayhew) about the delays in court and liability orders, it takes three to six months from the case being referred to court for a liability order to be granted. We expect that to reduce significantly.

    On the wider point about the Child Support Collection (Domestic Abuse) Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart), I am glad to endorse what many Members have said. The Bill will allow for cases to be moved from direct pay to the collect and pay service when one parent is a victim of domestic abuse. That is an important measure, and I am grateful to hear further support for it in the Chamber today. Its Committee stage is forthcoming.

    On the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury about why compliance figures have been decreasing, the Child Maintenance Service has been experiencing falling compliance figures since March 2021 after a period of improving compliance. A key driver of falling compliance is the difficulty of deducting child maintenance from universal credit payments. Universal credit prioritises other third-party deductions ahead of child maintenance deductions. Let me reassure the House that work is ongoing with universal credit policy colleagues to identify how deductions for child maintenance can be rightly reprioritised, and to recognise that collect and pay deals often with the most difficult cases. Parents can co-operate and make their own arrangements—that is one scenario—but we are talking about the difficult scenarios.

    I thank the hon. Member for Reading East (Matt Rodda) for raising concerns about backlogs. The CMS is committed to delivering service of the highest standards and has been recognised with customer service accreditation, an independent validation of achievement. It responds quickly to parents using the service. In the quarter ending June 2022, 84% of changes in circumstances had been actioned in 28 days. I say to parents that, as we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes, if something has changed, they should let the CMS know. Call handling has been improved, with calls directed to the most appropriate person.

    I would like to pick up on what my hon. Friend said about why maintenance calculations changes are factored in. Parents are able to report changes of income at any time. I reiterate that to him and any of our caseworkers. Where that change is greater than 25% of the income we hold on our system, we will alter their liability. Parents can ask for a calculation decision by the CMS to be reviewed through the mandatory reconsideration process within 30 days. If they are still not satisfied, they can appeal to the tribunal service.

    Danny Kruger

    I very much appreciate that point and that is indeed the case. I just wonder why 25% is the cut-off. It is quite a large amount. If a change comes in just underneath that, why should not that be considered as well?

    Mims Davies

    I thank my hon. Friend for raising that. I do not personally know the answer, but I am happy to look at that point and write to him.

    James Sunderland

    The Minister is talking eloquently about the need for courts to uphold and the need for parents to be chased for the money that they owe through the CMS. By the same token, although it is not within the scope of the Bill today, could she comment on the ongoing plight of those who do not have access to their children—those who are prevented from seeing them? We can all recall the plight of Fathers 4 Justice—Spiderman hanging from the gantries on the M25. It is important that we discuss, or at least raise today, the issue that it works both ways and that we also have to give deference in law to those seeking access to their children.

    Mims Davies

    I thank my hon. Friend for raising that. He is right to say that. We have seen this in our constituency surgeries: there are always two sides to every story. It is right that we have processes that are able to respond to that and that parents are able to see and engage with their children. I reiterate that my hon. Friend in the other place, who has day-to-day policy responsibility for this matter, is very much focused on reducing parental conflict. Above all, this is about supporting children, getting them the best start and ongoing support to thrive in life.

    Let me make some progress on the importance of today’s Bill. Child maintenance payments provide vital support to separated parents. Approximately 140,000 fewer children are growing up in poverty as a result of child maintenance payments. This includes payments through the family-based process and through the service. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud has already stated, in the past 12 months, more than £1 billion-worth of support was arranged and collected through the Child Maintenance Service. That exemplifies the intent of the service, which is to promote collaboration between separated parents and encourage parents to meet their responsibilities in providing for their children, meaning that youngsters get the financial support that they need for that good start in life.

    Research shows that children tend to have better emotional wellbeing and higher academic attainment growing up with parents who, together or indeed separated, have that good-quality relationship and are able to manage conflict well. Child maintenance cases are managed by two processes, as we discussed earlier. The collect and pay caseloads are more challenging. That is where a collaborative arrangement has either failed or not been possible. Therefore, these parents are considered less likely to meet their payment responsibilities.

    We know the difference that child maintenance can make in people’s day-to-day lives, so unpaid child maintenance should be paid immediately. We know that the vast majority of parents want to do the right thing to support their children financially. Where a parent fails to pay on time or in full, our strategy is to tackle payment breakdowns at the earliest opportunity and to take action to re-establish compliance and collect any unpaid amounts where they have been accrued.

    The Child Maintenance Service is able to deduct £8.40 a week towards ongoing maintenance or arrears from certain prescribed benefits, as I have discussed. Where measures prove ineffective or inappropriate in collecting arrears, the CMS will apply to the court service or the sheriff court for the liability order.

    The liability order enables the use of more stringent powers, as we have heard, and we are able to take more serious action. Since June 2022, the Child Maintenance Service has collected £2.7 million from paying parents with the court-based enforcement action in process. We regularly review processes and policies in line with best practice to deliver the best outcomes for parents and children, and I note the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes.

    Matt Rodda rose—

    Mims Davies

    I just wanted to turn to the hon. Gentleman’s point. I would like to write to him on that as I am not the Minister responsible for that day to day. I hope that he will understand.

    The details of these powers will be set out in secondary legislation, with the right for a liable parent to appeal against an administrative liability order. Regulation powers and other provisions will be included. That means that proper scrutiny can be undertaken by the Government and the relevant Committee. We can then make sure that the regulations include the right to appeal. Those regulations will also be subject to the affirmative procedure.

    The Bill is of great importance for the Child Maintenance Service. It will make sure that we make the necessary improvements we have heard about today to the enforcement process and, above all, that we get the money to children more quickly. I am pleased that the Bill has been introduced, and I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud for bringing it to the House.

  • Matt Rodda – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    Matt Rodda – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    The speech made by Matt Rodda, the Labour MP for Reading East, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    We wholeheartedly support the principle that non-resident parents should pay child maintenance, and that there should be enforcement when absent parents fail to pay. I thank the hon. Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie) for her work on the Bill and, indeed, for her wider work on this complicated and important matter.

    Too many absent parents fail to pay child maintenance, often leaving children and families in desperate need and emotional distress, which, as we heard earlier, can have very serious consequences for them. I pay tribute to those families who are suffering as a result of terrible backlogs and delays, and the whole House is deeply concerned about them. Many Members have tried to help constituents facing these dreadful problems, and will have responded through their casework. I also want to put on record my support for the work of charities such as Gingerbread that support parents, and to thank the Child Maintenance Service for its efforts in this important area. It continues to chase non-payment despite a series of difficult challenges, to which I shall refer later in my speech.

    Turning to the substance of the Bill, as I said at the outset, we completely support the principle that non-resident parents should meet their responsibilities for child maintenance, and where they fail to do so the state must step in to enforce payment. The CMS manages over 500,000 arrangements for child support, affecting 750,000 children. Maintenance payments are very important in reducing child poverty, as the hon. Member for Newbury (Laura Farris) mentioned, and it has been estimated that as many as one in five single-parent families on benefits are lifted out of poverty by receiving child maintenance payments; that is an important point for us to consider. Not only do we support the principle, therefore, but we recognise that the enforcement of child maintenance obligations needs to be improved.

    Enforcement action was affected by the pandemic. CMS staff were redeployed to manage the surge in universal credit claims, and the courts were closed. The number of liability orders in process fell from 6,900 in March 2020 to 2,400 in September 2020. That was a considerable drop, but since 2020 there has been only a partial recovery, and the most recent figures, for June 2022, are not only far lower than before the pandemic at 4,200, but are lower than in June 2021 by over 1,000 cases. The CMS therefore clearly faces some serious issues. The number of enforcement agency referrals now in process is less than half the number before the pandemic. The system for ensuring that child maintenance is paid needs to be efficient and fair, and we must address these points and discuss them thoroughly in this House.

    Although I understand the principles behind the Bill, I therefore have some questions. As I understand it, the purpose of the Bill is to make changes to powers introduced in the Child Maintenance and Other Payments Act 2008, but it seems that some of the powers—those that allow the Secretary of State or Department to make an order without having to go to the courts—have not been used by the Government. I realise this is a detailed point, but I ask the Minister to address it in her reply and to reassure me on it.

    The Bill makes provision for the Secretary of State to issue regulations governing appeals, and the powers granted are wide-ranging. For example, the Secretary of State will be able to make

    “provision with respect to the period within which a right of appeal under the regulations may be exercised”

    and

    “provision with respect to the powers of the court to which the appeal under the regulations lies.”

    This wording seems to give the Secretary of State a great deal of power to limit the grounds on which appeals can be made and the opportunity to appeal. Why are these powers being sought?

    Time is limited today, so I will conclude. We whole-heartedly support the principle that non-resident parents should pay child maintenance and that there should be enforcement for absent parents who fail to pay. I again take this opportunity to thank the hon. Member for Stroud for her excellent work on this; she has a great deal of expertise and the House and country is benefiting from it. I also pay tribute to parents and families affected by this terrible problem, as well as charities and campaigners, and to CMS staff working on those parents’ behalf. I hope the Minister will address my questions; they are somewhat technical, however, and I would be happy for her to write to me with further detail on them.

  • Luke Evans – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    Luke Evans – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    The speech made by Luke Evans, the Conservative MP for Bosworth, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    Who would have thought when I went to conference four or five years ago and was joined by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie), who is sat next to me, that we would both be here in the Chamber having this debate, almost three years to the day since our election? Actually, it was patently obvious at that point that she was going to become an MP, because she is diligent and driven. Her introducing the Bill is testament to that.

    On reading my hon. Friend’s comments from her Westminster Hall debate last month, it was so sad to note that about 280,000 children see their parents separate. That is a hugely concerning statistic, and a figure that we need to closely reflect on, as my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) pointed out. I am lucky and eternally grateful to have benefited from a being in a loving and stable family for nearly 40 years, but I appreciate that that experience is not universal.

    We all have CMS cases in this House, and we have often seen the anguish and the upset that the process generates. More broadly, before I came to the House, I saw in hospitals and GP surgeries the anguish that a given mental or physical issue would bring. A medical professional’s starting point is: how can I make things better? While I often could not solve the problem, I could help inform and equip people and ensure that the process ran smoothly. This Bill gives people a real chance to try and make these things better.

    I fully support this important legislation, because I believe that it sits well with the Government’s wider reforms to ensure that the work of the Child Maintenance Service is effective in preventing parents from evading their financial obligations to their children. While couples may fight and frustrate, we must keep in mind the best outcome for the children’s sake. When I was researching for the debate, I was surprised to see that more than 30 years have passed since the Thatcher’s Government critical “Children Come First” White Paper. Society has made changes since then, and methods to collect payments have certainly changed over those years. Much scrutiny and change has taken place, substantial amounts of water have passed under the bridge, and we have seen major systems redesigned.

    I note the important work of the Labour and coalition Governments to encourage and support family- based arrangements, and the fact that that work, and wider policy, have progressed with, seemingly, some decent success. Changes to the Child Maintenance Service have built on earlier reforms to ensure a fairer assessment of parents’ earnings, helping to prevent them from evading their financial obligations. These powers make a real difference in compliance by closing loopholes and strengthening enforcement.

    We must be thankful for this progress. We must never give up on the ideals, but we must balance them with the reality. According to a report from the National Audit Office published in March 2022, while the number of people making a family-based arrangement has increased as was intended, there has also been an increase in the number of people with no maintenance arrangement, as was pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson). I sense that the CMS is facing a considerable workload. At the end of December 2021, it was managing more than 600,000 arrangements for 560,090 paying parents, a 9% increase in the number of arrangements since the end of June 2021.

    We must also consider those who fail to pay any amount of child support maintenance, especially when deductions from earnings are not possible. I think that enabling the DWP to make administrative liability orders is a step forward, and I also think it right that those who are subject to such orders are able to appeal. I believe I am correct in saying that they can appeal but cannot challenge the amount that has been decided by the CMS, and I think that is the right approach.

    I hope the Bill is successful, and I also hope it can be seen in the wider context of the Government’s work to ensure that the child maintenance system has the legislation and the resources to enable it to manage modern Britain. No two cases in the UK are the same, and there are nuances that play out in all our constituency surgeries. We know that these have real, far-reaching consequences, but I sense that the Bill can be a key part of a wider commitment among my ministerial colleagues to ensure that, over time, everyone pays, everyone receives the right amount, and, most importantly, the child—

    Danny Kruger

    Will my hon. Friend give way?

    Dr Evans

    I will.

    Danny Kruger

    It is important for my hon. Friend to experience what it is like to be on the receiving end of an intervention.

    My hon. Friend said earlier that many couples did not have an arrangement at all. What does he think we can do about not just the couples whose arrangements have broken down, but those who did not put one together in the first place?

    Dr Evans

    That is a very good question—and I am so grateful to my hon. Friend for his sword-like intervention, cutting me off with one word to go before the end of my speech!

    It is important to engage with couples and ensure that they know where the resources are to enable them to have the necessary discussions, and I think that that is starting to happen as a result of signposting to, for instance, health visitors, GPs and schools, so that parents have an opportunity to speak to someone establish what their options are. Enabling them to have that dialogue is part of the work that the DWP and the Government as a whole should be doing. People need to understand fully what is available to them, and going through the court system may not be the right way for that to happen.

    I am hugely grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud, and I welcome the Government’s support for the Bill. I hope that it makes much haste.

  • Danny Kruger – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    Danny Kruger – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    The speech made by Danny Kruger, the Conservative MP for Devizes, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    We are talking about the saddest thing possible, the breakdown of the relationship of a couple with children—and not just the pain of the breakdown, but an ongoing feud that often lasts for years, re-traumatising the children and embittering the parents. We must always remember that the effect of divorce or separation is usually impoverishment, both for the adults involved and for their children—and indeed for elderly parents; they should not be forgotten in this, nor the capital that is lost to them and their future care. The effect on whole families of divorce and separation and the loss of half a child’s adult world when his or her parents separate acrimoniously can often cause a lifetime of emotional damage.

    I start by stating plainly that there is nothing more important we can do as a society or in this place than to help people to form stable, lasting and loving relationships, particularly in the context of bringing up children. I am conscious that we spend a lot of time in this place debating means of mitigating the effects of family breakdown, but not a lot of time debating how to prevent the breakdown in the first place. We discuss how to provide ambulances at the foot of the cliff to pick up people who are falling off, but spend very little time discussing how to put fences at the top of the cliff to prevent the damage in the first place.

    Nevertheless, when the worst happens, it is right that we do what we can to ensure that the obligations of parents to support their children are upheld. That is why we have the Child Maintenance Service. I want to reflect on the work that the service does. Its work is increasing; as we have been hearing, the CMS manages over 600,000 arrangements for child maintenance, up 9% just in the six months to last December. We have also seen an increase in the collect and pay arrangements—a bad sign in itself—with 37% of the total number of CMS arrangements now managed through collect and pay, up from 30% just a few years before. Compliance is running at around two thirds, which is understandable, but sad and essentially unsatisfactory.

    My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie) mentioned the 2012 reforms, which were partly designed to encourage voluntary and family arrangements, and have been successful in that regard. I agree with her about the success of those reforms and that those arrangements have increased, but we must recognise that the number of separated couples without an arrangement has also increased. According to the National Audit Office, it appears that there is no clear change in the number of families with an effective arrangement in place.

    The fact is that only one in three separated families have arrangements that are working and in which payments are made in full. For all the progress that has been made—and I recognise my hon. Friend’s point that the CMS is dealing with very many difficult cases—we still have too many non-payments or payments not made in full. At any one moment, we are all dealing with many cases of constituents reporting their frustrations with the CMS. It is very frustrating for our offices to deal with them, too. I want to quickly pay tribute to my senior caseworker, Camilla Jequier, who is dealing with so many of these cases any one moment—I am sure that we all have a Camilla in our offices battling with the CMS on behalf of our constituents. She does tremendous work, patiently and sympathetically supporting constituents.

    I will give a couple of examples on both sides of the parental dispute. A caring parent reports that the non-resident parent has another job and has increased their earnings, with that apparent to HMRC, but the CMS will not increase the payments that the non-resident parent—the father—is making. Another non-resident parent has continued his old business using cash. He is claiming universal credit fraudulently—a CMS financial investigation has confirmed that—but, because the UC claim is in place, it cannot collect the child maintenance that is due. I spoke yesterday in support of keeping cash in our economy, and I very much support that, but I recognise opportunities that that gives for such fraudulent behaviour.

    On the other side, there is the case of a paying parent who has been out of work for six months. The collect and pay arrangement has continued, and the father’s home is now under threat because the CMS has not recognised the loss of earnings. There is another case where the CMS is using gross earnings from before the pandemic, not recognising the substantial loss of earnings that that parent has endured in recent years. It is not able to use up-to-date HMRC data.

    I reference those as examples of the frustrations that constituents have, while also acknowledging the very good work that the CMS is doing. We do not get reports of good work from Government agencies; we just report the bad ones. However, I am afraid that there are still too many of those.

    I support the Bill and pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud, who has been a tremendous campaigner on the issue. It is a good Bill, and I am pleased to see that the Government—and, I am sure, the Opposition—supporting it. It is an important step to ensure that we can improve compliance. I also thank the DWP for its support for this important Bill and for enabling the CMS to do its work better. I hope that we will see the same from HMRC in due course.

  • Peter Gibson – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    Peter Gibson – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    The speech made by Peter Gibson, the Conservative MP for Darlington, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Broadland (Jerome Mayhew), and to speak for the second time today, this time in support of the Second Reading of the important Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie). It is important to highlight that the Bill closely complements another private Member’s Bill, as has already been alluded to, currently progressing its legislative journey: the Child Support Collection (Domestic Abuse) Bill, introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart). Both Bills will significantly improve the child support system. I was delighted to support the Child Support Collection (Domestic Abuse) Bill, and I am equally delighted to be here to see today’s Bill pass its Second Reading, as I am sure it will.

    It is absolutely right that all parents have a legal responsibility to support their children financially, quite apart from any moral responsibility that they have too. Child maintenance is key to reducing the number of children in low-incomes households through family- based arrangements and Child Maintenance Service arrangements. Parents in separated families receive approximately £2.4 billion a year in child maintenance payments, which are essential to those families’ wellbeing and financial security. There are an estimated 2.3 million separated families in Great Britain, with 3.6 million children in those families, and 60% of separated families have child maintenance arrangements.

    The Child Maintenance Service manages cases either through direct pay or, as we have heard, collect and pay. In both cases, the Child Maintenance Service calculates how much maintenance should be paid. For a direct payer, the money passes directly from one parent to the other. For collect and pay, the CMS collects the money from the paying parent and pays it to the receiving parent, but there are collection charges for the use of collect and pay—20% on top of the liability for the paying parent, and 4% of the maintenance received by the receiving parent.

    Under current legislation, direct pay is the default option unless both parents request collect and pay, or the receiving parent requests collect and pay and the paying parent is deemed unlikely to pay by demonstrating an unwillingness to pay their liability. That is so that paying parents have the option not to incur additional charges should they pay in full and on time. Some 846,300 children are covered by CMS arrangements, of whom 526,500 are covered through direct pay and 298,400 children are covered by collect and pay. Given the growing number of children covered by CMS arrangements, the Bill is welcome.

    The Bill deals largely with the way in which child support payments are recovered in cases in which arrears have accumulated. Currently, if arrears have accumulated under the collect and pay system, the non-resident parent is usually sent an arrears notice. Caseworkers may negotiate and put in place a repayment plan. The Child Maintenance Service aims to recover arrears within two years and expects the non-resident parent to pay up to 40% of their net income to clear it.

    In March 2022, the National Audit Office published a report on child maintenance that said that parents now rely less on the state to help them to make maintenance arrangements—an aim of the Government’s 2012 reforms. Although the number of people who make a family-based arrangement has increased as intended, there has also been an increase in the number of people with no maintenance arrangement. The report said that, as a result, there has been no clear change in the number of families with effective child maintenance arrangements since the Government reformed the system in 2012.

    It is estimated that only one in three separated families in Great Britain has a child maintenance arrangement for which the agreed maintenance is paid in full. Indeed, at the end of June 2022, cumulative arrears stood at £493.5 million and the National Audit Office projection is that at current rates the amount will reach £1 billion by March 2031. That figure is far too high. It is absolutely right that we have in place a system that ensures that we can and do enforce payments effectively. The House will be aware of the National Audit Office report that highlights ongoing issues with Child Maintenance Service collection and enforcement activities. I doubt that any Member has no constituency cases on the issue; indeed, I have had more than two dozen in my case load.

    If the paying parent refuses to comply, it can take years before payments are made to the receiving parent. Enforcement in respect of arrears does not always ensure future compliance. It can take years before payments are made to receiving parents if the paying parent refuses to comply. In addition, enforcement has not been properly built into the universal credit system. Currently, the Child Maintenance Service can deduct only a flat rate of £8.40 of maintenance from a person’s universal credit award and cannot deduct partial deductions. Before 2019, the maximum that the Child Maintenance Service could deduct from benefits towards arrears was a mere £1.20 a week.

    There are currently four ways for the CMS to collect arrears without a court order: a deduction from earnings order; a deduction from earnings request for those in the armed forces; a deduction order from bank accounts; and the collection of assets from a deceased non-resident parent’s estate. A court order gives much stronger powers of collection, with the use of bailiffs in England and Wales and of sheriffs in Scotland.

    Following the removal of a parent’s right to enforce themselves in 2005, the state now has sole responsibility for enforcing obligations and has discretion over whether to pursue enforcement. It is clear that the state must do more to ensure the enforcement of child maintenance collection. The Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud would do just that. Her Bill would alter the current regulations to ensure that if the DWP agrees that a person has failed to pay an amount of child support maintenance and a deduction from earnings has not been possible or is not appropriate, the DWP would be able to make a liability order in respect of that amount against the person. This will replace the existing system whereby the DWP must apply to the courts for a liability order, thereby streamlining the system and removing the unnecessary delay to the recovery of child maintenance arears that the process of applying for liability through the courts can create. The Bill would give the CMS the ability to ramp up the enforcement of collection much quicker than it has previously been able to.

    I see how this Bill complements the Child Support Collection (Domestic Abuse) Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye. It would allow child maintenance cases to be placed on the collect and pay service if there is evidence of domestic abuse, providing another layer of protection to some of the most vulnerable in society by preventing survivors of abuse from having to engage directly with their abuser through the CMS. However, on the collect and pay system an abuser may seek to continue to torture their victim by not paying the child support they owe. The Bill from my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud will ensure that swift action can be taken in such cases, so that an abuser cannot evade paying child maintenance.

    I am delighted to be able to support this Bill, which will streamline the child maintenance system and enable us to ensure that more people can pay child maintenance on time and in full. I am sure it will command cross-party support, and I offer my sincere thanks to my hon. Friend for bringing it forward today. I wish her all the best as she continues to guide it through the legislative process, and I hope to see it pass all its stages very soon. I have got into the habit of offering Members my services on their Bill Committees, having offered once already this morning, so I offer the same to her.

  • Jerome Mayhew – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    Jerome Mayhew – 2022 Speech on the Child Support Bill

    The speech made by Jerome Mayhew, the Conservative MP for Broadland, in the House of Commons on 9 December 2022.

    I, too, rise to support this Bill and the great efforts of my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie) in support of families.

    Relationships are a wonderful thing. From my personal experience, they are the aspect of life that gives me greatest fulfilment. What lies at the core of our relationships provides the value of life, much more so than careers, even careers in this place. We have to recognise, however, that they do sometimes go wrong and that the negative experiences can be as intense as the positive ones.

    Although relationships can change, responsibilities for our actions remain. That is particularly the case when children are involved. A person’s livelihood and support for their children are factors when it comes to a broken-down relationship. It is very important to say that when relationships that involve children break down, in the vast majority of cases the absent parent continues to provide financial support on a voluntary basis. Negotiations take place, often without solicitors or lawyers, and an informal arrangement is reached that is satisfactory to both parties. What we are dealing with here, however, is the small minority of cases where negotiations have failed or where an agreement that has been reached is subsequently breached. That is why the CMS is such an important agency to provide support for those families who are most in need.

    Existing child support legislation is intended to provide a mechanism for the collection of support funds when voluntary agreements have failed. My hon. Friend set out in her opening speech the various mechanisms that are currently available. It is true that under the current scheme, the CMS can apply to the court in certain circumstances in order to get a liability order to seize, through the bailiffs or the sheriff courts, assets to satisfy a debt. The reason I intervened earlier was to highlight the hugely significant role that delay plays in frustrating the needs of families and, in particular, the children. That is particularly the case in the covid aftermath, when delays in the civil justice system are very substantial. I am sorry to say that even before covid, there was significant strain in the civil court process, leading to lots of delay. That delay matters, because we are dealing with the financial support necessary to feed, clothe, heat and support children.

    Right hon. and hon. Members will be intimately familiar with the problem, because of the casework that they receive. To my mind, the Bill is very timely, because just last month a constituent came to me who was owed by the absent—non-resident—parent the sum of £136,833 in arrears of child maintenance. We have to stop for a moment and consider the profound impact of that non-payment on the children. It is simply not good enough to say, “You can go back to the CMS, which in time can make an application to the courts for a liability order. Once that has been processed, we can apply to the bailiff court, and in due course we will get an order to seize goods,”

    I welcome the Bill’s intention, which is to cut out the delay of having to apply to the court, and to give powers to the DWP to make a liability order in certain circumstances that allows assets to be targeted via the bailiff or sheriff courts, without the additional factor of delay. Essentially, the Bill aims to fill a lacuna in the armoury of the recovery of funds to support children, and maintain financial responsibility for children from a non-resident parent. It will help my constituents, and for that reason alone I support it.