 House of Commons |
Session 2006 - 07 Publications on the internet General Committee Debates Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill |
Child Maintenance and Other Payments Bill |
The Committee consisted of the following Members:Chris
Shaw, Committee
Clerk
†
attended the Committee
Public Bill CommitteeThursday 19 July 2007[Mr. Christopher Chope in the Chair]Child Maintenance and Other Payments BillFurther written evidence to be reported to the HouseCM 2 Families
Need
Fathers
CM
3 National Family Mediation
(NFM)
9.10
am
The
Chairman:
Before we begin, let me say that hon. Members
may remove their jackets during sittings if they wish. Will everybody
please ensure that their mobile phones and other electronic devices are
turned off? Copies of the money resolution and the Ways and Means
resolution for the Bill are available in the Committee
Room.
With that, we
move on to the familiar territory of clause by clause
scrutiny.
Clause 1The
Child Maintenance and Enforcement
Commission
Andrew
Selous (South-West Bedfordshire) (Con): I
beg to move amendment No. 70, in clause 1,
page 1, line 4, leave out ‘a body
corporate’ and insert
‘an Executive Agency of the
Department for Work and
Pensions’.
The
Chairman:
With this it will be
convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 96, in
schedule 1, page 46, line 21, leave
out paragraphs 9 and
10.
No. 97, in
schedule 1, page 48, line 2, leave
out paragraph 17.
No.
98, in
schedule 1, page 49, line 29, leave
out paragraph
22.
Andrew
Selous:
I welcome you back to the third sitting of our
Committee, Mr. Chope. It is a pleasure to serve under your
chairmanship. We are now back in what is for most of us the more
familiar territory of a Public Bill Committee. For me, at least, the
evidence-taking sitting was my first experience of that process. I
found it useful, and it certainly brought back memories of being in a
Select Committee in the previous Parliament. On a more serious note, I
believe that we obtained some very useful evidence from our witnesses,
some of which I shall refer to during our deliberations
today.
Amendment No.
70 and its consequential amendments—Nos. 96, 97 and
98—would retain the status of the Child Maintenance and
Enforcement Commission, the Child Support Agency’s
successor
body, as an Executive agency of the Department for Work and Pensions,
rather than changing it to that of a non-departmental public body. We
touched on that subject during the evidence-taking sitting, but not in
great detail, so I hope that you will allow at least some debate,
Mr. Chope, on why the Government are making that
change.
It might be
useful briefly to remind the Committee of the distinction between a
non-departmental public body and an Executive agency. I am informed by
the Library that the term “non-departmental public body”
was first used by Sir Leo Pilatsky in 1980 and was described
thus:
“A body
which has a role in the processes of national government, but is not a
government department, or part of one, and which accordingly operates
to a greater or lesser extent at arm’s length from
ministers.”
The Library
brief goes on to say
that
“Their
distance from government means that the day-to-day decisions they make
are independent as they are removed from ministers and Civil
Servants.”
In contrast,
an Executive agency will have a chief executive who will report to a
Minister against specific
targets.
A number of
questions therefore come to mind, and when the Minister replies I would
be grateful if he were to tell the Committee whether the
Department’s view is that over-meddling by Ministers was one of
the problems with the agency. Were Ministers spending too much time
distracting senior management from their tasks in the CSA, and was that
unwelcome? What lessons can we learn from ministerial involvement in
the past?
The setting
up of a new non-departmental public body will have public expenditure
implications. I have read the regulatory impact assessment and the
notes to the Bill, but I cannot find the specific cost associated with
establishing a new body rather than continuing with the CSA and perhaps
changing its name. Could the extra money be better
spent?
There are
questions too on the timing of setting up such a body. There is wide
agreement across the House that it has been a very troubled agency,
under Conservative and Labour Governments, since it was set up in 1993.
On the face of it, it is curious that Ministers are taking a more
hands-off approach, when there are so many problems within the agency
and so much uncertainty over the future of CMEC. There is a huge
question about the number of parents who will or will not move to
private voluntary agreements, but that is just one of the problems. I
have a number of questions about why the Department is going down that
route.
I remind the
Committee that Janet Allbeson, the last witness in the second
evidence-taking session on Tuesday afternoon, referring to the change
to a non-departmental public body,
said:
“It is
quite hard to see why it is necessary. It will cost a lot, and it will
take a lot of time and resources to set up...I think that
Ministers are quite keen to put it at arm’s length from
them”——[Official Report, Child Maintenance and
Other Payments Public Bill Committee, 17 July 2007; c.
84.]
One of my questions is
exactly how much that will cost.
I hope that the
Minister can reassure us. I do not believe that any member of the
Committee, least of all the ministerial team, has anything other than
the best
intentions. I believe that they want to make this work, and that the
Committee is united across party lines. We all want an organisation
that will work, and detailed scrutiny and probing in Committee will
contribute towards that.
To conclude, I would like some
form of reassurance from the Minister on how that arm’s length
relationship will work. The public, parents who have not been getting
maintenance, non-resident parents who have been extremely frustrated by
inaccurate assessments and the way in which they have been treated by
the agency and, most importantly, children want reassurance that
Ministers are not pushing off the body to arm’s length so that
they can say that it does not have so much to do with them, as was the
case when it was an Executive agency. That is the sum of my concerns
about the amendment, and I look forward to hearing the
Minister’s
reply.
The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and
Pensions (Mr. James Plaskitt):
It is a pleasure
to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Chope, and we also
look forward to Mr. Taylor’s chairmanship. I endorse
the Opposition spokesman’s welcoming the innovation of our
evidence session; I, too, think it was helpful. I hope that it will
help us to hit the ground running as we move into our clause-by-clause
consideration of the Bill. I welcome all members of the Committee. I am
pleased to say that, for the remaining stages, I will be supported by
my the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend
the Member for Stirling (Mrs. McGuire), who will take
forward some of the clauses of the Bill, including those relating to
mesothelioma.
I am
slightly surprised by the amendment, because when we received Sir David
Henshaw’s report on how to reconfigure child care in the UK, we
thought that there was broad acceptance of his recommendations across
the House. That included his central recommendation, which
is
“that there is a need
for fundamental change in the way child support is organised in this
country.”
The switch
from an agency to a non-departmental body on a commissioning
arrangement, as we propose, is at the core of that fundamental change.
The amendment would prevent the commission from being established as a
non-departmental public body. Instead, responsibility for child
maintenance would continue to rest with an Executive agency of the
Department for Work and Pensions. In effect, the amendment means that
the CSA would continue to exist as it is
now.
We believe, in
agreement with Sir David Henshaw, that a much more fundamental change
is required. There is after all, as the hon. Member for South-West
Bedfordshire confirmed, a legacy of failure associated with the CSA.
Sir David noted that repeated efforts had already been made to reform
the agency and concluded that a fundamentally new approach and a new
organisation were needed. We agree with that, which is why the Bill
establishes CMEC to take on responsibility for the child maintenance
system.
It is not
enough for the new organisation simply to be the CSA operating under a
different brand. It is essential that we mark a clean break with the
failures of the past and give the commission a better platform for
success. We believe that establishing the commission as a
non-departmental public body is essential to achieving that. The
differences are important. With an Executive agency, decisions must be
taken with the interests and priorities of the Department in mind.
Similarly, the most senior leaders of an Executive agency are part of
the leadership team of the entire Department. They cannot always be
focused on one key area of delivery, such as child maintenance. As a
non-departmental public body, the commission will be free from those
competing
priorities.
It is not
the case, as suggested by the hon. Gentleman, that Ministers are trying
to get this matter at arm’s length in our own interests. Our
interest is in getting the structure right, so that the organisation
can deliver on its central objectives. It will operate at arm’s
length from Ministers and the Department, and it will be led by an
independent board. That board will focus solely on pursuing its
statutory objectives, and it will have complete freedom to take
operational decisions. For example, the commission might look to make
greater use of the skills and expertise of the private or third sectors
as it seeks to deliver services in the most efficient and effective
manner. We believe that the focus and autonomy that goes with a
non-departmental body is crucial, if we are to deliver a successful
child maintenance system and, as the hon. Gentleman has said, that is
what we are all trying to
ensure.
Lastly, as
hon. Members will be aware, clause 15 will break the compulsory links
between the statutory maintenance service and the benefit system. Given
that, and given the personal and sensitive nature of the issues the
commission will deal with, an arm’s length relationship with
Ministers is more appropriate than an Executive agency. I hope
therefore that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw the
amendment.
Andrew
Selous:
I asked the Minister a specific question in
relation to cost. I have probably lost my chance to get him to come
back on that, unless he intervenes while I am speaking, but I would be
grateful for the information. Hopefully we are not talking about a huge
amount of money, but it would be good to know what it
is.
The Minister has
said that there is a need for fundamental change. We all agree that
fundamental change is necessary, because the current system is not
working. We need to start in a pretty radically new manner to make the
improvements that we all want to see. I am not completely convinced by
his argument that fundamental change can come about only by the
creation of a non-departmental public body. There are many Executive
agencies across Government in which Ministers seek fundamental change
and ensure that it happens. With the Highways Agency, for example,
there must have been many times when Transport Ministers have banged
the table and said that they want to see fundamental change because the
agency has not been delivering on its objectives. I am therefore not
sure that his argument fully stands
up.
Concerns have been
expressed that even when CMEC becomes a non-departmental pubic body, it
will be essentially the same people in the same buildings using the
same computer system. I do not totally buy the Minister’s
argument that its becoming a non-departmental public body will, in and
of itself, cause
the public to say, “Right, this is a completely new
organisation,” because they will pick up the telephone to speak
to the same people, and they will realise that statements are coming
out in pretty much the same way, but with a different name at the
top.
Andrew
Selous:
Absolutely not. That would be very foolish. The
Minister has said that he is seeking fundamental change, and I was
making the point that changing the type of organisation in which the
same staff operate in the same buildings is not in and of itself going
to cause fundamental change. This is a slightly esoteric point, and I
do not intend to press the amendment to a vote—it is a probing
amendment. I am slightly disappointed, however, because I had hoped
that the Minister would be a little more forthcoming and perhaps more
convincing about the need to spend money and change the legal
structure. If he were to intervene to let me know about the cost, I
would be
grateful.
The
Chairman:
Order. I am happy to allow the free flow of
debate. Each member may speak more than once. I cannot force people to
speak if they do not want to but if, after the hon. Gentleman has sat
down, the Minister wishes to rise again, I will allow
that.
Andrew
Selous:
That is extremely helpful, Mr. Chope.
The Minister will have heard those comments, and we shall see whether
he rises to my request for a little more information. This is
essentially a probing amendment to find out more about the
Government’s thinking. I do not think that their arguments stack
up, but that is not the main point, because we have far more serious
issues to address. If the Minister feels able to reassure me slightly
further than he has been able to, I shall be grateful. I beg to ask
leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave,
withdrawn.
Clause 1 ordered to stand
part of the Bill.
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