Examination of Witnesses (Questions 320
- 339)
WEDNESDAY 15 SEPTEMBER 1999
MR JIM
PARTON, MS
KAREN RANDALL
AND MR
BARRY PEARSON
320. Much of the anxiety expressed around shared
care from other witnesses has been the desire to disentangle the
maintenance payments from issues of contact, access, care, etc.
Your proposals would link them very closely, would they not? Is
there not a danger that might actually increase the stress between
parents?
(Mr Parton) I must say I do not think it does link
them any more closely, it is just working on the principles that
are there already, we are just applying the percentage rate equally
between both parents. I do not think it is linking contact with
the money but what it is doing is recognising that children do
cost money, we concede that is what this is about perhaps, but
they cost money equally to both parents when they are caring for
the children and that has to be recognised.
321. One final question linked to that. Mr Farquarson
in his evidence said that they have a slight anxiety, they favour
the shared care proposals in the White Paper but they have an
anxiety that this might encourage parents with care to resist
extra sharing of care because they lose money. That obviously
runs counter to your organisation's objectives. Is that a risk
you are willing to take, that it would be increased from your
proposals?
(Mr Pearson) First of all, I do not belong to Families
Need Fathers, I am an independent view here. Perhaps I only represent
taxpayers, I do not know. We have done some work based on this
particular formula for a fairer shared care proposal. What happens
when we look at the details is that, in fact, as the non-resident
parent takes over more and more care of the child and the formula
reduces, with this particular approach if the original 15 per
cent was a good number in the first place then the PWC does not
get worse off by losing the care of the child, the amount of money
that the child support is reduced by matches the reduction in
the direct spend of the PWC. As Karen said, it is in the detail
and that is why we tried these diagrams here because otherwise
you are going to glaze over with the mathematical formulae. When
we look at it what we find is that if the 15 per cent is the right
amount then it actually becomes cost neutral whether a parent
cares or pays someone else to care. If the 15 per cent is perhaps
too low and the children actually cost more than the 15 per cent
then, in fact, the PWC becomes better off when the NRP takes the
child away.
322. Except for the fixed cost element. That
is true of the variable cost but the fixed cost element, which
could be considerable, obviously they will not be saving that.
(Ms Randall) That is the same for both of course.
If the mother has a child for four nights a week, the bedroom
is sitting empty for three nights and if the father has the child
for three nights a week, the bedroom is sitting empty for four
nights. The fixed costs are the same for both and do not reduce
by that amount.
323. Do you see what I am saying about your
calculations, that if, say, a third of the total costs of the
child are fixed, and I have no idea if that is true, but let's
say it is a third of that, then in fact the savings which are
being made by the child spending more time with the other parent
are less than the losses from the reduction in maintenance payments?
(Ms Randall) I think it is not just about saving money,
but it is about the money actually following the child and being
seen to follow the child. The alternative is that if we do not
have a fair shared care formula, it will be financially advantageous
for fathers to abandon their children and not maintain contact
with them. We cannot see that that is in the interests of children,
but we see that shared parenting is in the interests of children
and we see that the child support proposals in the White Paper
are probably the single largest social policy issue that will
impact on shared parenting and we are trying to look to the future.
Shared parenting is actually increasing and will continue to increase
and I think we need to address this now, not look back in five
years' time and say, "Whoops! We got it a bit wrong",
but there were not that many shared cases at the time and so had
said, "Let's try and address it later".
324. I am not arguing with you about the fair
division of costs or the proposal to encourage shared parenting.
I am just wanting to be clear that your proposals would not act
as a barrier to that move towards extra shared parenting because
the parent with care would have the incentive perhaps to resist
that.
(Ms Randall) I think the other answer is that that
is a matter for the courts and where contact has been ordered
and it has been denied, that is dealt with by the courts at the
moment and should continue to be dealt with by the courts.
(Mr Pearson) I feel myself that one of the problems
that has occurred with the Child Support Agency is that it appeared
to have too many objectives and it was not just about child support,
but it was also about repaying the Treasury for benefits and things
like that. It appeared to have too many objectives which conflicted
with one another and caused a lot of anger. A new child support
system, if it focuses on child support and the many child needs,
it may stand a chance of succeeding. What concerns me is if it
turns into a system to impose a bribe on the PWC to let the NRP
have access to the children or something like that. It is starting
to get too many objectives and it will fail to succeed on any
of those objectives.
Chairman
325. Can I turn now to the question of sanctions.
Do you have any views about sanctions, people having their passports
and their driving licences and indeed their pocket money seized?
Do you have a view about that?
(Mr Parton) If the Government willy-nilly ploughs
ahead with the proposals, there is no question that prison does
work. It is used often in the family courts, far more often probably
than any of you realise. I can think of several of our members
who have been in contempt of court over an antique chest of drawers,
as one guy I know, and there was another one who attempted to
see his children by standing on their route to school and waving
to them, which was one reason why he was sentenced, and he was
sent down for six months, and another one broke an order by sending
a letter and he was sent down for eleven months, so these sanctions
exist and I think that they unquestionably work, but they are
draconian and I do not think there is any place for prison in
families, or at least only very rarely and there does not seem
to be, for example, a community service option. If you do plough
ahead with the White Paper as proposed, then you probably could
make it work by carrying out the threat to put people in prison
and take away their driving licences. I have to say that I thought
that when the White Paper was announced, "the hanging is
too good" sort of rhetoric was utterly lamentable, very regrettable
I think and the dad-bashing here has to end.
326. Do you have any figures as to how many
people have actually gone to prison and actually served sentences?
(Mr Parton) No, I have not.
327. You seem to be suggesting that it was a
direct result of some child maintenance questions which have gone
to court because of—
(Mr Parton) It can be chattels and it can be contact.
There is a readiness in the family courts to use the final sanction
of prison on fathers. There is not the same readiness for mothers,
but actually I think it is wrong for both fathers and mothers
and I think we should be getting away from that if we are a compassionate
society. To me, there is nothing I can see positive about that.
328. But prison cares for families!
(Mr Parton) You can imagine that a number of our members
are in prison and we have people writing to us from prison saying,
"I want to see my little Johnny. What can I do about it?",
so it is a serious issue.
(Ms Randall) Yes, any system will need sanctions.
The system has them at the moment. There are quite wide-ranging
sanctions, including the option of prison at the moment, as we
heard from Nicholas Mostyn. It is not used very much. I think
the point is to get a system which is fair, which would, therefore,
be acceptable and which, therefore, would be complied with. Sanctions
are a later resort and they should not be the first resort, but
yes, any system will need sanctions to back it up and we accept
that.
(Mr Pearson) I have got a comment and that is that
if the formula was clearly a fair one as far as the general public
is concerned, there might be a chance that not paying your child
support would become socially unacceptable, like drink-driving
or something like that. While there is this focused resentment
because there are clear faults in the formula and as a result
of that there is always news that says, "Look, there is something
wrong here. Perhaps the Government has got to change it",
then it will never become socially unacceptable not to obey this
Agency. That is just a view I have got, although I have no evidence
to back that up.
329. Do I understand you to mean that if you
reduce the 15/20/25 to 7/10/12, it would get to a level where
people could not with any degree of credibility say that they
were not paying it?
(Mr Parton) We are not arguing about the percentage.
330. You are not?
(Mr Parton) No.
(Ms Randall) Our evidence is centred almost entirely
around the shared care formula, that that has to be got right,
that we cannot have an outcome that actually penalises fathers
who care most for their children by making them pay more to do
that and actually rewarding them for abandoning their children
and never seeing them.
(Mr Parton) You will see this very clearly in our
case study 4,[13]
I think.
331. Indeed some of the submission is very detailed,
but very, very useful and we will be able to draw on that.
(Mr Parton) You can see exactly why parents might
even collude to defraud the CSA.
(Mr Pearson) There is an example here where when the
non-resident parent decides, "I have had enough. I am not
going to look after my children because we are not getting enough
money in", at that point the non-resident parent becomes
£43 a week better off and the taxpayer becomes £36.95
worse off, so the taxpayer in that particular case, because it
involves child care credits and so on, in effect is bribing the
non-resident parent not to care for the children.
(Mr Parton) To abandon his responsibilities.
(Mr Pearson) It is astonishing the way these systems
interact that push things the wrong way.
Mr Leigh
332. I think my aim is like yours; I would like
to see a system which provides a clear financial advantage to
fathers who want to share the care of their children and I am
with you on that. I thought that the Government's plans as outlined
were making progress towards that, and inadequate progress I am
sure you would agree, but some progress. Now, as I understand
it, you are saying that the one-seventh deduction per night for
shared care is necessary because—and, by the way, this constant
referring to "PWC" and "NRP", we understand
it, but I am not sure that it is entirely helpful in getting your
message across because acronyms never are—but the parent
with care does not have the—
(Mr Parton) We are trying to be PC.
333. Well, please do not be PC, especially with
me! In addition, however, the PWC, just to use your language,
must be assessed at 15 per cent of income contributing costs to
the NRP. I think I understand all that. It would be lovely if
the Government would agree to that. The trouble is presumably
they will not because the Government will say that the parent
with care simply cannot afford these sorts of deductions. Will
the Government not say that?
(Mr Pearson) The answer is that simply because of
the way the formula works what we are saying is that while the
PWC or the mother, shall we say mother?
334. Let us say mother.
(Mr Pearson) Seven per cent of the time I think it
is the father but let us say mother. That person would be responsible,
according to the 15/20/25 rule, for the time that the mother is
the absent parent. If the mother is on benefits that is zero.
If the mother is on very low income, say £100, then it would
not even be a proportion of £5 a week, it disappears. It
just does not cut in as a significant number until the parent
with care starts to earn a significant amount of money. It might
do if you start taking the parent with care's low income, add
the Working Families Tax Credit and so on, but it just does not
cut in until the parent with care earns a significant amount of
money and that is when it starts to have an effect. Once you get
to an equal earning point and an equal sharing point there is
no net liability either way unlike the White Paper proposal where
if the parent with care and the non-resident parent, so-called
for some reason, shared care equally the one not claiming child
benefit ends up paying nearly half the amount that he would pay
if he never saw the child for some bizarre reason.
335. You are an expert in all this, it is very
easy for you to understand it but for us mere mortals who are
not tax experts it is a tiny bit confusing. If your idea is such
a good one, and from what you tell us it is, what has been the
Government's response to it so far?
(Ms Randall) We have not put it to the Government.
We put a different proposal to them initially and that was to
reduce it by two-sevenths for each night of shared care and they
rejected that. We have now gone back and we have tried to define
a fairer system. We think this is a fairer system because it takes
the Government's own principle, which is that the non-resident
parent should contribute 15 per cent of their net income, and
it just applies that to both parents in shared care cases. So
it is taking their figure and applying it equally to both parents
but only in shared care cases. We are talking about 25 per cent
of cases at the moment. It is also fairer than what we originally
proposed which was a two-sevenths reduction because the two-sevenths
reduction ignored the fact that women tend to earn 20 per cent
less than men. This actually acknowledges the fact that women
tend to earn 20 per cent less than men and they will, therefore,
be assessed at that. Fifteen per cent of their income will be
of their actual income and this recognises that fact. We do think
this is a fairer system. We have not had the Government's response
to it but we very much hope that they will look at it.
336. If we were to introduce your system you
are arguing that there would not be any increased costs to the
taxpayer, that there would be a clear incentive to the father
to spend more time with his children and in most cases the mother
would not be any worse off. Is that what you are saying?
(Ms Randall) Yes.
(Mr Pearson) There are cases where it is an extra
benefit saving and that is the case where the parent with care
earns a significant amount and it is the non-resident parent on
benefits, in which case there is actually a flow the other way,
well off parents with care will not get as much and will end up
not as well off under this scheme.
337. Under your scheme?
(Mr Pearson) Under this scheme. They will not get
all this money moving towards them, they will have to take some
extra financial responsibility themselves.
338. How much better off must you be? I am starting
to get worried about my own voters now.
(Mr Pearson) I do not know who your voters are.
(Mr Parton) Wealthy divorce«s.
(Ms Randall) For example, on our case study number
three[14]
where the parent with care has a net income of £300 and the
non-resident parent has no income at all and she has four nights
of shared care and he only has three, on the Government's system
she would spend from her own income £30.60 out of £300
and from zero income, he is on benefit, he would be left with
£31.40 out of his Jobseeker's Allowance to look after his
child for three nights a week in shared care. If we applied our
system to that his retained income would go up to £41.84
and her retained income would come down to £250 instead of
£270. It is not as punitive on the parent with care as one
might think, it actually still tips the balance in their favour.
339. Thank you.
(Mr Pearson) I would like to make another point here
and that is this is not a scheme that has never been tried around
the world, it is actually the shared care formula that operates
in several countries in the world.
13 See Ev p. 123-4. Back
14
See Ev p. 122. Back
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