Examination of Witness (Questions 270
- 279)
WEDNESDAY 15 SEPTEMBER 1999
MR ANDY
FARQUARSON
Chairman
270. May I reconvene the Committee and welcome
Andy Farquarson who is here representing the National Association
of Child Support Action, a body which has been active in the field
since the early days of the Child Support Agency. I think your
colleague Michelle Counley is unable to be with us this afternoon.
If that is so can you tell us what your relationship and what
your office is in the organisation and what her relationship is
and maybe make a short opening statement and we will take questions
from there, if we may.
(Mr Farquarson) Michelle is the newly
elected chair of the association and she sends her apologies for
her absence. I was expecting to be here to support her and also
to be supported by our statistician who is in Holland. Ms Counley
cannot attend because her sister is having a baby whom we very
much hope will not later become the subject of a child support
order! I am the immediate past chair and authorised by the Committee
of NACSA to speak for the organisation this afternoon. I very
much feel I am here alone not only literally but also metaphorically.
Listening to the evidence so far there seems to be a fair unanimity
that the scheme proposed by the Government will be the panacea,
the way forward. I am afraid my organisation takes the dissenting
view. We do not believe that this is the way forward. Furthermore,
we believe that the Government has missed a golden opportunity
to make a really new start in child support. We see the White
Paper proposals as reform of the existing system, substantial
reform I grant you, but reform nonetheless. We have campaigned
long and consistently for a different system. My personal belief
is that the Child Support Agency is almost beyond reform. That
said I concede that the present Chief Executive has made great
strides towards improving the service ethic of the Agency. Most
of the points I would raise are in our policy response document
which with apologies is rather prolix but before I do I would
like to quote something Frank Field said in the Channel 4 documentary.[1]
I will paraphrase as I have not got my glasses with me. He said
that when parliamentarians of all parties agree, then that is
the time for the electorate to be worried and for the taxpayer
to look carefully at the proposals before Parliament. So that
would be our starting point, that the mistake in 1991 and the
mistake again in 1995 was insufficient scrutiny. I do not believe
that will happen this time. I think the lesson of insufficient
scrutiny has probably been learned and well understood. Thank
you.
271. Thank you. Your organisation say that the
CSA is irredeemable. Does that mean that you would want to revert
back to the system that pertained prior to 1991 when the Agency
was brought into being? What is the alternative or should there
be one? Are you saying that the thing should be abolished altogether
full stop?
(Mr Farquarson) Obviously there must be an alternative.
We do not advocate a return to the courts as they were because
we recognise also that particularly in the areas of enforcement
and collection the court system let down parents with care. We
do not accept the argument, however, that one of the great failings
of the court system was inconsistency. We believe that inconsistency
is inevitable because the issues are complex. Every family has
different circumstances. Geography can affect it, as one of the
members of the Committee observed this morning. House prices in
London are enormously higher than house prices in my own area
in the Midlands and again further north. So we do not accept that
as a criticism. We do not advocate that we return to the court
system as it was. Equally, we do not believe that child support
is purely an administrative process and, furthermore, we think
it is anomalous that virtually every aspect of family breakdown
and separation is dealt with in one fora with the exception of
child support which is dealt with by a different department of
government. We look, as we say in our submission, for a unified,
entirely new professional service that looks at all aspects of
family breakdown that all comes together probably under the aegis
or guidance of the Children Act 1989 and that would in our view
best come under the aegis of the Lord Chancellor's Department
so, yes, a family court or family mediation or family tribunal
service that did have discretion. We realise that there would
be in that a cost to the taxpayer. Given the cost to the taxpayer
of the present system, that may sound like a bitter pill to swallow,
but in ten years' time I do not want my successor sitting here
saying "Told you so". We had this in 1991. This was
going to be the answer to every lone parent's prayer. It has not
been. We genuinely do not believe that what is proposed in the
Green Paper and White Paper is an answer to anyone's prayers.
272. If you had your wish and set up this law
family centre way of tackling the problem do you think it would
get to the position where people would be more willing to comply
with the demands that were placed on them?
(Mr Farquarson) Yes. I think compliance is an issue
that the Committee have heard evidence on from virtually every
organisation represented. I think Nick Mostyn this morning summed
it up. The key to compliance is two-fold, firstly effective sanction
and we have no problem at all with enforcement of legal and moral
responsibilities. The second key—and I think this is the
crucial one and goes to your question Chairman—is that compliance
is dependent upon a perception, particularly on the part of the
payer rather than the payee, of fairness and I do not think that
it is very easy for the Government to sell to the general public
the notion that a rigidly enforced formulaic non-discretionary
system that does not, to use a metaphor, give them their day in
court is fair. I also strongly contest something that was said
under Chatham House rules so I cannot attribute it, that simplicity
equals fairness. Personally to me palpably it does not. It may
have merit in other areas but I do not think it equals fairness.
If you do not have a perception of fairness then compliance becomes
a real problem.
273. A final question from me before I turn
to Andrew Dismore. That means that you think that the White Paper
proposals if they were to be implemented would result in the same
level of unrest, anger and disruption that we have seen in past
years if this White Paper is translated into a new set of legislation
that the people who are the payers, as you describe them, do not
like?
(Mr Farquarson) I need a crystal ball to answer the
question categorically. It is my belief that it will stir up new
anger, a different hornets' nest whilst not assuaging the anger
of the people in the existing scheme. I think the danger where
one disregards totally the parent with care's financial circumstances,
her income, her capital, her overall financial position, and I
know what the Minister will say in justification, and levies 15
per cent from the paying parent to the non-resident parent of
itself will bring into the CSA a huge raft of so-called private
cases so you will have another group of discontented people. I
think we cite in our submission that it will bring in professional
people with a lot of experience of campaigning and/or complaining.
Equally, I do not think it will meet the anxieties of those in
the present system. We have heard a lot of evidence about the
difficulties of the transition period. Chairman, you asked earlier
is the anger still there. In my experience, yes it is. It has
now been channelled from the streets and from the bands into this
place, our mass lobbies, our letter writing campaign, our exhortation
to members and people who turn to us for help to take the matter
to their MPs' surgeries. I hope we have brought it back to Parliament
but the anger is still there, subdued yes, and of course as with
any system the initial reaction is always more extreme than subsequently
so I do not think, quite honestly, that you are going to see 10,000
people sitting down on Westminster Bridge. I do not believe that
will happen, but I do not think on the other hand that your post
bags will be any lighter, that our lobbies will be any less well
attended or that our letter writing campaigns will not continue.
Mr Dismore
274. The Independent on Sunday last month[2]
quoted from one of your publications directly as follows: "NACSA
cannot guarantee its accuracy, usefulness or even legality and
reminds readers that any decision to make use of this information
is theirs alone". If that is the case how can we be sure
that what you are telling us today is accurate, useful, legal
and not other adjectives we might choose to use?
(Mr Farquarson) The quote is from our
so-called Survival Guide. It is ways of dealing with the
CSA for parents with care and for non-resident parents. You cannot
take any of the evidence that I give you as quantitative research.
We are not a research organisation. The evidence that we hear
is anecdotal, the evidence is qualitative. Everybody in NACSA
does this not as a hobby but does this in their spare time. Most
of those giving evidence to this Committee have had either a professional
involvement, lawyers for example, or are researchers or directors
of charities working in the field. They can give you the statistical
evidence that you want. We cannot nor do we claim to.
275. Do you accept the definition of yourselves
given by some members to quote from the Independent on Sunday
who "openly describe themselves as `pocket revolutionaries'".
Do you see yourself as one of those?
(Mr Farquarson) Do I see myself? I was rather under
the impression having not read the IoS article that that
sobriquet was attributed to the Minister. I may be wrong.
276. Not according to this article.
(Mr Farquarson) No, I do not see myself as a pocket
revolutionary. I see that as rather demeaning. I know that some
members of our organisation probably do consider themselves as
such but we are a broad church and certainly not policemen.
277. You said earlier on that you had no problem
with the enforcement of moral and legal responsibility.
(Mr Farquarson) Personally, no.
278. That is what you said.
(Mr Farquarson) That is what I said.
279. How do you square that with quoting from
the same article the group offering tips on delaying the introduction
of CSA payments including failing to return documents or "forgetting"
to include relevant information, and returning to the CSA their
correspondence unopened marked with the words "gone away"
or "not known at this address"?
(Mr Farquarson) How do I square those two?
1 "Can't Pay, Won't Pay"-broadcast in three
parts on 12, 19 and 26 September 1999. Produced by Brook Lapping. Back
2
8 August 1999. Back
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