Schedule
1
The
Commission
Andrew
Selous:
I beg to move amendment No. 71, in
schedule 1, page 44, line 12, at
end insert—
‘(2) The person
appointed to chair the Commission, and the chief executive and
non-executive directors of the Commission, must
have—
(a) relevant
experience of leading, or senior management in, a large public or
private sector organisation, and
preferably,
(b) a demonstrated
knowledge of family policy
law.’.
Thank
you for your guidance during our last debate, Mr. Chope. The
point of the amendment is to ensure that the people appointed to chair
the commission and to be its chief executive and non-executive
directors should have the relevant management competence to lead this
new organisation and some knowledge of the area of public policy that
CMEC will deal with.
I am surprised that the
advertisement for the chair has already been placed,
given that we have not yet set up the organisation. Is that not
slightly presumptuous of the Government? I know that they have to
forward plan, but that two-days-a-week post has been advertised at
£100,000 a year. That works out at an equivalent annual salary
of £250,000 a year, which is considerably more than that of our
new Prime Minister, who earns around £187,000 a year. I do not
begrudge a large salary for the chair of the organisation. It is an
extremely important job, and it requires the right set of skills,
determination and focus to ensure that the agency delivers day in and
day out on getting money to the children who need it and looks after
parents with care, non-resident parents and
children.
9.30
am
Concerns have
been expressed in the past that occasionally appointments seem to be
made with slightly more party political attachment than one would hope
for. The House of Commons Library has informed me about appointments to
health trusts in recent years. In one analysis, there were shown to be
206 self-declared Labour activists, 28 Conservative activists and 27
Liberal Democrat activists. Again, I am not making a
assumption—I am merely seeking reassurance that the people whom
we recruit to chair the new organisation will be absolutely the best
people for the job, regardless of their
background.
The need
for relevant experience is important. Just because a person has been
the chairman or chief executive of a large, private sector
organisation, or because they have run a chain of supermarkets
extremely well, that does not necessarily give them the right skill set
to make a success of CMEC.
Mr.
Tim Boswell (Daventry) (Con): I am grateful to my hon.
Friend and find myself much in sympathy with his comments. In addition
to the specification that he set out in the amendment, does he agree
that it is extremely important for the person to have good
communication skills? One of the difficulties in the past was that the
agency was seen as remote and unfriendly. Once that image has been
acquired, it is very difficult to overcome.
Andrew
Selous:
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry,
and am particularly grateful that he is able to serve on our Committee
with his long experience as both a Minister and a shadow Minister. He
has taken a close interest in these matters for a long time, and I am
sure that both sides of the Committee would agree with me that we are
grateful for the benefit of his advice during our
deliberations.
I
agree with my hon. Friend that the people we are looking for—the
chair and the chief executive—must not only run the organisation
extremely well in terms of day-to-day delivery, but undertake an
extremely important communication task. The phrase “changing the
culture” has quite rightly been mentioned on many occasions. I
know that it is something the Government are seeking to do. The
position has a high salary and, as I have said, I do not begrudge that,
because we are looking for an impressive set of skills including
management competence and relevant experience of dealing with
children’s issues and family law matters.
The person must also have the ability to communicate with the country at
large and explain why the payment of maintenance is a civic duty and a
personal responsibility for us all and that it is not something that
can be dealt with by the general good will of taxpayers.
Mr.
Mike Weir (Angus) (SNP): Given the difficulties that the
Child Support Agency has had in the past, does the hon. Gentleman share
my concern about the fact that we are advertising for a chief executive
for only two days a week? Often someone who gets that sort of job also
sits on other public bodies. Is that enough time to get CMEC up and
running and to do all the things that the hon. Gentleman rightly says
are necessary, such as communicating throughout the country and setting
up a system that works for parents and
children?
Andrew
Selous:
The hon. Gentleman has raised a valid point. This
will be a massive task. In addition to appointing the chief executive
and the non-executive directors, the chairman—whoever he or she
is—will have a huge job setting up the agency and getting it off
to the right start.
I
was surprised when I learned from Janet Allbeson in the second
evidence-taking sitting that the advertised post was for two days a
week. I look forward to hearing from the Minister why that is the case.
Most of us agree that £100,000 a year is enough to get one up
and out of bed every morning for perhaps five days a week—many
of us get up and out of bed and work very hard for quite a lot less
than that.
Hopefully,
the person appointed will not be restricted to working two days a week
and will be entitled to go into their office and make progress on other
days of the week. Will the Minister reassure us that he will be looking
at candidates who do not have heavy commitments for the other three
days a week just in case the Government have got their calculations
wrong and the chairman’s role turns out to be full time?
In the early days of
the agency, when the chairman will have to deal with massive inherited
problems such as the uncertainties around how many parents will go into
these appropriate voluntary arrangements, I can envisage the job taking
considerably longer than two days a week. I look forward to hearing
what the Minister has to say on that point. I have no doubt that the
Minister and the Department are keen to get the very best people for
the job, but looking at schedule 1, it seems to me that we should
stiffen our resolve to deal with the concerns on this matter to ensure
that we really do get the very best people for the
job.
Paul
Rowen (Rochdale) (LD): We support the
amendment. As has been said, CMEC is a new start, and
a huge level of expectation rides on its success. The Government have
taken a risk in making it a non-departmental body. In that case, it is
vital for the confidence of the 1.4 million people who use the CSA at
the moment—we have been told that that will hopefully reduce to
1 million—that the organisation gets on the right footing from
day one. I think it hugely important that the job requirement states
that the person or persons appointed must demonstrate some knowledge of
family policy law. Obviously alongside that, one would expect
them to have senior management experience in other public sector or
private sector organisations. We must ensure that we are not going
about this in a roundabout way. This is not a normal organisation in
which somebody is appointed on a part-time basis in the hope that that
will work.
Child
payments at the moment are in crisis. We all know that from our
caseload of people who are not getting the money that they deserve.
Whoever is leading and running the organisation has clearly got to work
more than two days a week and must demonstrate that they are committed
to this fresh start. If not, we will see a CSA mark 2, which no one
wants.
Mr.
Plaskitt:
I thank the hon. Members who have spoken in this
brief debate. I will deal with some of the points that have arisen in
the course of the debate. First, placing the advert at such an early
stage is normal procedure. We do not want to lose any time. It is not
that we are unreasonably anticipating the outcome of the Bill. The
posts, if filled, will be filled on a conditional basis. They will not
be formally up and running until the Bill receives Royal Assent. Once
that has happened, we will be all ready to go, so we will avoid losing
valuable time.
The
issue of salaries has been raised in the debate. I reassure the
Committee that we arrived at the salary for the chair of CMEC after a
comparative exercise with other non-departmental public bodies. The
role is comparable with that performed by those who chair the pensions
regulator, the Environment Agency, the Pension Protection Fund and the
Health and Safety Commission, for example, which have similar
remuneration packages.
Some have questioned whether it
is appropriate for the role to be part time. It is perfectly usual for
the chair of such an organisation to be recruited on that basis,
although that does not prohibit them from spending more time on the
job. It is important to bear in mind that the chair will not carry the
entire load in setting up CMEC. There will be a board, a full-time
chief executive and so
forth.
Mr.
Boswell:
By way of consolation not only to members of the
Committee, but to the Treasury, I point out that there is a strong
likelihood that, if whoever is selected is worth their salt, as
Ministers will want them to be, they will be so committed that they
will give much more than the notional two days a week. I invite the
Minister casually to reflect on whether he knows of any chairman of a
non-departmental public body in that kind of role who actually delivers
only two days a
week.
Mr.
Plaskitt:
I would not like to name such an individual. I
take the hon. Gentleman’s point. In his earlier intervention on
the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire, he mentioned the
importance of communication skills. He was absolutely right that
communication will be an important part of the duties of the chairman
of the organisation. If the hon. Member for Daventry has seen the
advert, he will know that we are placing precise emphasis on that, by
declaring that we are seeking an individual with “inspiring
communication skills.”
Andrew
Selous:
Will the Minister reassure the Committee that,
whoever is interviewed for the post, it will be made clear that there
is a high likelihood that the appointment will be full time, at least
in the early months? I take the point that it will formally be two days
a week. When everything is up and running and working perfectly, as we
all hope that it will be, two days a week will be fine, but I would
hate anyone to come into the post and say after a few months,
“Well, it says 48 hours, that’s it.” There are
massive communication tasks to be done, including dealing with the
media and perhaps travelling round the country to talk to disaffected
family groups. I hope that those points are made through the interview
process.
Mr.
Plaskitt:
I do not think that a clock-watcher is likely to
get the job. I thank the hon. Gentleman for tabling the amendment,
which has given us the opportunity to debate some important aspects of
the issue. I understand why he tabled the amendment and the way in
which he did so, but I hope that he will understand that we do not
believe that the criteria that he is seeking to bring forward should be
included in the Bill. He rightly drew attention to the skill set that
we want the new commissioner to have. We want all those in key posts
across the commission, including the chair, the executive staff and
those on the board, to hold a wide variety of skill sets. It would
therefore not be appropriate to be too specific in the Bill about skill
sets. I hope that he understands that we agree about the skill sets for
which we are looking. We can find them without specifying them in the
Bill, however. For that reason, I hope that he will not press his
amendment.
Andrew
Selous:
I have found the debate useful. I am grateful to
the Minister for his reassurance in respect of this probing
amendment.
9.45
am
Like every
Committee member, I have a great desire to make a success of CMEC and
getting the right people is critical. Unless the right people are round
the board table in that organisation, it will not work. Many other
things need to be in place for it to work, but without the right people
it will not. I am reassured by what the Minister says and therefore I
beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment.
Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn.
Paul
Rowen:
I beg to move amendment No. 60, in
schedule 1, page 44, line 15, at
end insert ‘and approved by
Parliament’.
In
view of the Prime Minister’s statement a couple of weeks ago
about wanting to ensure that Departments are much more
accountable—including their public appointments—I am sure
that the Minister will have no problem with the amendment, which would
insert into the schedule a provision that, although the Secretary of
State will appoint the chair, that appointment should then be approved
by Parliament. Given that we are setting up a new organisation at
arm’s length from the Department, it is vital to public
confidence in the success of CMEC that, although the chair of the
organisation is appointed by the Secretary of State, the appointment is
approved by Parliament.
The Prime
Minister spoke a couple of weeks ago, taking up the
issues raised by the Select Committee on Public Administration, of
which I am a member, and promised hon. Members that public appointments
would be subject to scrutiny by Parliament. We have a perfect
opportunity to demonstrate that the Prime Minister is bringing in a new
broom and that this post can, should and will be dealt with accordingly
by a
Committee.
Andrew
Selous:
Does the hon. Gentleman think that the Select
Committee on Work and Pensions would be the appropriate body to do the
approving, or should such a matter come before the whole
House?
Paul
Rowen:
I believe that the Work and Pensions Committee is
the appropriate body to approve this appointment. Given that CMEC is an
arm’s length organisation, there is considerable scope in the
Bill to ensure that that Select Committee takes a much greater role in
ensuring that CMEC delivers. I hope that the Minister can say,
“Yes, we now have a new broom and we will make a new start. This
will be the first public appointment that will be approved by
Parliament through the Work and Pensions
Committee.”
Mr.
Boswell:
Mr. Chope, may I welcome you to the
chair? I shall not make extensive contributions during the
Bill’s passage, although I would like some details clarified and
it is worth at least spending a moment on this
matter.
I started as a
sceptic on public appointments on the grounds that there is, if not the
tidy separation of powers that characterises some other systems, at
least some difference in principle between the role of a Member of
Parliament and that of the Executive in this country—even if
that is largely composed of Members of Parliament—in that the
Government decide what they want to do and we decide whether they are
doing it and hold them to account if they are not. In a sense, there is
a confusion of roles if Parliament then assumes an Executive
responsibility, because it might be said or deemed to have appointed
the person involved. I appreciate that that is not exactly what the
hon. Gentleman has in mind, but the general public might say,
“He or she is your person, rather than the appointment of the
Government.” That is, to some extent, being broken down for a
couple of reasons—I will not go on at length—one being
that the Nolan rules have already inhibited the selection. Indeed, I
remember that that was beginning to happen during my time as a Housing
Minister. I hope that it made no difference to the probity of my
appointments, but I think that it affected the process and acted as a
constraint.
However,
if we are going down that road there is an argument for saying that we
should engage those experts who take part in Select Committees and who
take a serious interest in such matters. Most of us here, whether or
not members of a Select Committee, would regret the fact that, despite
the huge volume of constituency case load work that comes through the
CSA at present, not enough hon. Members take the details of such issues
sufficiently
seriously.
There is
another argument in favour of the measure. Because of past
sensitivities, there is concern about the degree of ownership or
stakeholding if there is a
parliamentary role. In effect, that is the mirror image of the
argument that I have just developed. If hon. Members
believe that it is important to get things right and say that, within
the Prime Minister’s new rubric, they would like to become
involved—if they show that they take the issue seriously and
want the right person for the job—it would send a signal and, as
earlier exchanges have shown, suggest a more constructive and balanced
approach to the selection of an important post. It is fair to
say that, at the beginning of my parliamentary
career, I would have rejected such a matter out of hand as being a
constitutional aberration, but I am beginning to warm to it. I shall
listen with great interest not only to my hon. Friend the Member for
South-West Bedfordshire if he wishes to respond, but to the Minister,
in particular, to hear his thoughts about what is potentially an
interesting
experiment.
Mr.
Plaskitt:
I had a suspicion that the hon. Member for
Rochdale might hang his proposal on the Prime Minister’s
statement of 3 July. I was not
disappointed.
However,
I draw the attention of the hon. Gentleman and that
of the hon. Member for Daventry to what is actually being proposed. I
suggest that the hon. Member for Rochdale studies carefully
“Governance of Britain”, published by the Ministry of
Justice, which backs up the Prime Minister’s statement. For
accuracy purposes, I shall read into the record a short section from
the document so that we can be clear about what is being proposed and
why I shall suggest that he withdraws the amendment. It
states:
“there are a
number of positions in which Parliament has a particularly strong
interest because the officeholder exercises statutory or other powers
in relation to protecting the public’s rights and interests.
Some of these appointments are not subject to oversight by the
Commissioner for Public Appointments or other form of independent
scrutiny.”
The
Government therefore believe that Parliament, through
its Select Committees, should play that role. That is made clear in
setting the parameters for extending Parliament’s role, but the
post is indeed overseen by the Commissioner for Public Appointments, so
it is outwith the scope of what is being proposed. However, the
appointment of that commissioner is one of those posts that should now
become subject to parliamentary approval. It will
happen.
Mr.
Plaskitt:
The objective that the hon. Member for Rochdale
is after will happen
indirectly.
I am
grateful to the hon. Member for Daventry for his intervention because
he rightly drew our attention to the important role of the Select
Committee. I am absolutely certain that, just as the Select
Committee’s inquiries helped us immensely in preparing the Bill,
it will rightly want to have before it the key personnel who will
eventually take important positions in CMEC and in getting its
organisation under way. It is right that that should be the
case.
As the Secretary
of State will be ultimately accountable to Parliament
for the commission’s performance, it is appropriate that he has
the power to appoint the chair of the organisation. That process is
consistent with appointments made to other non-departmental public
bodies. I hope that I have reassured the Committee that our current
appointments process ensures that the appointment of chair, as with all
non-executive appointments to the board, will be regulated
independently and scrutinised by the Office of the Commissioner for
Public Appointments. With that reassurance, I hope that the hon. Member
for Rochdale will agree to withdraw his
amendment.
Andrew
Selous:
I listened with interest to the hon. Member for
Rochdale putting forward this proposal, the comments made by my hon.
Friend the Member for Daventry, and what the Minister said in reply. I
am grateful to the Minister for quoting from the document issued by the
Department for Justice. It was helpful of him to do that. However, I am
not sure that it entirely made his case. Of course, it did in a
strictly legal, technical sense. He is completely correct in what he
says, and I do not doubt that for a moment. However, as far as I
remember, he talked about Parliament having a role where there was a
statutory duty—as there is in this case—for passing an
Act of Parliament. He also talked about the need for Parliament to be
involved in overseeing appointments where the rights and interests of
citizens were being guarded. I cannot think of any more important
rights and interests to citizens. Some of the most vulnerable citizens
of this country are children up and down this land, many of whom are
kept in poverty because they do not receive the maintenance to which
they are legally entitled. In a sense, by reading out the document,
although legally and technically correct—I stress
that—the Minister was almost undermining what he was saying. I
am not sure that I am hugely relieved by the fact that the Commissioner
for Public Appointments, who will oversee this appointment, is approved
by Parliament. That is one step
removed.
Mr.
Boswell:
It is a pretty funny audit trail if we
here and, in particular, our constituents in the real world, do not
like what is happening, and the only way that we have redress is to
sack the Commissioner for Public Appointments because he or she has
failed to intervene to stop an inappropriate public appointment by the
Secretary of State. Of course, the Minister is right that the Secretary
of State would be liable here, but it is all getting very remote, is it
not?
Andrew
Selous:
I am grateful, as always, to my hon. Friend, who
is right to say that we will approve the approver, but that that is
remote. I am reminded of the shots that we occasionally see on the 10
o’clock news of powerful committees of the American Congress
hauling people before them to be appointed or to quiz them. Many of us
in this House look across the Atlantic with a degree of envy at the
power of the American Congress to ensure that people who are appointed
to senior appointments are the right ones, and that the public interest
in who is being appointed to the key posts is being
safeguarded.
The
amendment is all the more important because we are now getting a
non-departmental public body. It is slightly more removed, so if there
were an extra degree of parliamentary oversight, at least of the person
who will chair the body, that would row us back a little in the right
direction.
Paul
Rowen:
I listened to what the Minister said and was
disappointed with his very narrow interpretation of the Ministry of
Justice White Paper. Certainly, as a member of the Public
Administration Committee, which has published a report on how we wish
public appointments to be made, that is not the route that we wish to
pursue. We are not suggesting that the chair of CMEC should be selected
by Parliament. That is quite properly the Minister’s
responsibility. There will be a new procedure to ensure that the
procedures that are followed have a proper audit trailed through the
Commissioner for Public Appointments. However, at the end of the day,
all that we are doing is asking that that appointment is approved. If
we are serious about wanting to give Select Committees more powers,
particularly with arm’s length agencies such as CMEC, that
sanction is
important.
10
am
Andrew
Selous:
I am listening with interest, and if the hon.
Gentleman is minded to press the amendment to a Division, I shall urge
my hon. Friends to support him. Does he agree that were this procedure
to happen, it would be pretty rare for the Government’s chosen
candidate to be overturned? We accept that the Government, in good
faith, would go out and scour the world, not just the UK, to get the
very best people. Some pretty amazing things would have to be found out
by the Select Committee’s interrogation for such an appointment
to be overturned. It could be an extra seal of approval on the
Government’s choice, which they may be pleased to have in times
to come if things do not work out
properly.
Paul
Rowen:
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for those
comments. I agree that we are not talking about an American
Congress-type interrogation process. If the Minister cares to read the
Public Administration Committee’s report, he will see that it is
very much about establishing a direct link to the appointments from the
Select Committee that will oversee their work. The fact that a person
appointed has been approved by the Select Committee is important when
it comes to arm’s length, non-departmental
organisations.
Andrew
Selous:
I can think of a further argument in favour of
what the hon. Gentleman is saying. Does he agree that if a Select
Committee approves someone, it will take a particularly strong interest
in that person’s performance and in the performance of the
organisation? The Select Committee will be on the back of the
organisation all the time to ensure that it delivers, because the
credibility of members of the Select Committee will be on the line.
Their constituents will come back to them and say, “You were on
the Select Committee. You approved this lady or gentleman to be chair
of this organisation, and now they are not delivering.” I can
see an increase in the frequency of Select Committee inquiries and in
the intensity of the questioning. We have discovered the beginning of a
virtuous circle.
Paul
Rowen:
I agree, and some of my later amendments would
ensure that the organisation is more accountable to Parliament. When an
organisation is directly run by the Secretary of State, it is very easy
for the Minister to be called to account.
Stephen
Hesford (Wirral, West) (Lab): The hon. Member for
South-West Bedfordshire is wrong. The relationship would become very
cosy, and the Select Committee would be tarred with the brush of the
failing person. If they were too closely linked, members of the Select
Committee would be more likely to want to support the person they had
appointed, or they would, in effect, have to criticise themselves for
making that decision. Does the hon. Member for Rochdale agree that the
amendment would have the opposite effect to that suggested by the hon.
Member for South-West
Bedfordshire?
Paul
Rowen:
No, I do not. We should consider what happens in
other places. For example, as hon. Members who have been school
governors know, when a school governing body appoints a head teacher,
that body is responsible for that decision and continues to exercise a
watching brief over what that head teacher delivers on behalf of the
parents and children. If he or she does not deliver, the governing body
has the powers to deal with the
situation.
Mrs.
Nadine Dorries (Mid-Bedfordshire) (Con): That is exactly
the point. It is a matter of accountability. As long as the Secretary
of State remains ultimately responsible for the appointment, a watching
brief is exactly the role that a Select Committee could play, rather
than having a cosy relationship from which there would be no benefit to
the children, the Department or anyone else, least of all the Select
Committee, which would not be ultimately accountable. It is therefore
more likely that the Select Committee, which consists of hon. Members,
will push the person and the Department to deliver the best. If that
Department fails, especially in the instance we are discussing, no one
stands to gain. The previous Department failed under both
Administrations—no one can say it was a
success.
The
Chairman:
Order. That is far too long for an intervention.
We are getting into a rather unvirtuous circle of very long
interventions.
Paul
Rowen:
I agree, Mr. Chope,
but the interventions show our very strong wish to press the amendment
to a Division, because in the context of the Public Administration
Committee’s report and the Prime Minister’s statement,
this is an opportunity for the Government to have a clean break, a
fresh sweep and a new start in terms of accountability to
Parliament.
Question
put, That the amendment be
made:—
The
Committee divided: Ayes 5, Noes
10.
Division
No.
1
]
Question
accordingly
negatived.
Paul
Rowen:
I beg to move amendment No. 66, in
schedule 1, page 46, line 36, at
end insert—
‘(3) The
Commission is to be responsible for ensuring that appropriate staffing
levels are maintained in order for it to fulfil its functions as
determined in section 2 of this
Act.’.
The
amendment seeks to make it clear that the commission is responsible for
ensuring that there are appropriate staffing levels and that they are
maintained so that it can fulfil its functions as determined in clause
2. I am sure that hon. Members will appreciate from the evidence that
we had on Tuesday just how important it is that there is no reduction
in staff numbers until it is certain that CMEC is functioning at the
required standard. Given the administrative problems of the CSA in the
past, its current reputation and the need to ensure a clean break, as
recommended by Sir David Henshaw’s review, it is important to
state now while we are dealing with CMEC that there will be appropriate
staffing levels to enable it to carry out its job.
Current plans are that by 2008,
over an 18-month period, there is likely to be a staff reduction of 20
per cent. Approximately 2,000 staff will deal with all cases, both
historic and new. We heard from the Ministers on Tuesday that those
staff cuts are based on an assumption—it is at this stage only
an assumption—that a significant number of parents will choose
to make voluntary arrangements rather than use the statutory scheme. As
we heard in the evidence from the lady from One Parent Families, that
cannot be guaranteed at this stage. It is therefore vital that we do
not rush headlong into making cuts that may well render the
organisation as useless and unfit for purpose as the CSA.
The significant increase in
parents using the voluntary routes is partly based on the repeal of
section 6 of the Child Support Act 1991. That ensures that parents with
care who receive benefit will no longer mandatorily have to use the
CSA. In the regulatory impact assessment the Government have estimated
that that move will reduce the case load of the statutory scheme from
130,000 to 100,000 calculations each year. They have made assumptions
also about the efficacy of the proposed child maintenance information
and support services, on which, so far, we have had very little
detailed information. I have serious concerns, therefore, in advance of
the establishment of CMEC, about arrangements and staff cuts that could
render the organisation
problematic.
During
questioning on Tuesday, we heard about some of the arrangements that
the CSA is trying to make to ensure that although a constituent does
not get an individual case officer, some 30 or so officers will, at
least, be available. However, what will happen if, over that 18-month
period, staff numbers are thinned out? That will make things very
difficult.
Albert
Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab): The hon. Gentleman is
absolutely right. The transition period is the most important issue,
but is not part of the solution that training should take place now, so
that people are used to the new system? Quite often, large
organisations change their systems, but do not train their staff in
advance.
Paul
Rowen:
I appreciate what the hon. Gentleman is saying. I
think that if we were starting with a blank page, that would be okay,
but given the historical debt and the number of cases on the first or
second tranches of the CSA, there has to be continuity. I hope that the
new arrangements involving the third or voluntary sector, which will
allow it to provide information and support, will bring about an
improvement, and, if the Bill gets going in the way that it should, I
hope that more parents will move towards voluntary arrangements.
However, that will not happen overnight. Our concern is that at the
moment we are going headlong towards that reduction without guarantees
that the improvements and changes have taken place. Clearly, it will
take a lot of public education to raise awareness and give people
confidence in the arrangements.
Given what has happened, we
have to give parents the confidence that the new arrangements will
guarantee that they will get the payments for their child that they
deserve, but that will not happen overnight. It will take time for the
information service to get up and running and to get the message out
there. Therefore, we believe that to go headlong, right at the
beginning, into the 20 per cent. reduction, will build up trouble. If,
after a 12 or 18-month introduction, during which CMEC is set clear
targets, we look at how things are progressing and find clear evidence
that more parents are switching to private arrangements and the case
load is reducing, it will be right and proper to introduce the
reduction. However, we should not say, “We are going to go ahead
and do this, because we believe that we are right”, because
judging by evidence from the CSA, we have not always been right and
have let down a generation of children. In this particular case, I ask
that that not be done, that we proceed carefully and slowly and that we
make those staff reductions only when we have evidence that there has
been a clear shift in the case load and numbers with which CMEC has to
deal.
Mr.
Weir:
I agree with the comments made by the hon.
Gentleman. There is a serious concern here. Often we have problems when
trying to get in touch with the CSA on behalf of constituents coming in
to see us. One of the complaints is that they cannot speak to the same
person about their case. I noted during the evidence session, when the
Ministers were pressed on that matter by the hon. Gentleman, that
Mr. Geraghty said
that
“we will have groups
of about 20 to 30 people who have a case holding between
them.”——[Official Report, Child
Maintenance and Other Payments Public Bill Committee, 17 July 2007;
c. 10.]
To have 20 or 30 people
dealing with one case is a lot. Even if someone phones up, they will
still not be able to get hold of the same person each
time.
10.15
am
In my
experience, someone phoning up the CSA often gets somebody reading what
is on a computer screen, and that is all that they can get unless they
ask them to go away and examine the case in more detail. When somebody
is not getting their money, or does not know what is happening with
their case, that is not sufficient. I do not blame the staff of the
CSA—the problem is the system, not the staff. In my experience,
the staff try their best to help. I have visited the Falkirk
centre, which deals with most cases in Scotland. I have seen that it has
a good operation and that its staff work hard, but there is a systemic
failure.
Andrew
Selous:
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the issue that
he has identified, of which we all have experience through our
constituents, could be dealt with if there were a proper record and
detailed accurate case history, recording previous conversations, on
the screen that the member of staff looks at? Then it would not be such
a
problem.
Mr.
Weir:
That is correct. It should happen, but it does not
always. Too many cooks spoil the broth. There are too many people, and
not everybody records things in the same way. Anyone who has worked in
an office will have kept files. Several people look at them, and
sometimes people have different ways of working, so it can be difficult
to follow a
file.
I
appreciate the fact that it might be impossible to have one person on
each case. The staffing would not allow for that and it would be
unrealistic to demand it, but the system must take account of the
problem. Under the present proposals, all current CSA staff will be
transferred to CMEC under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of
Employment) Regulations 1981, which is right and proper. It is not
their fault that there are problems with the agency. However, I note
that, when questioned by the hon. Member for Llanelli in the evidence
session, the noble Lord McKenzie said that by the time CMEC is started
up
“we will have reduced
the number of people that we have, because under the
Department’s Gershon efficiency target, we have to manage a 15
per cent. reduction by the end of this business
year.”——[Official Report, Child
Maintenance and Other Payments
Public Bill
Committee,
17 July 2007; c. 17.]
In an
organisation that is not functioning properly—we all agree about
that—one problem is getting hold of people and getting proper
information, and the expected reduction is large. In the evidence that
we took there were obvious uncertainties about the number of people who
will use CMEC, whether there will be really be a reduction of 500,000
people and how many will use voluntary agreements. It is wrong to
consider the reduction before CMEC is up and running and we can see
what the situation
is.
Stephen
Hesford:
Is not the hon. Gentleman’s argument a
misunderstanding of the system as it is and as it will be? Given the
staffing levels, which have been as they are for 10 years, when we have
been in a mess, they are not the issue. The hon. Gentleman has
identified that the system is at fault, not the staff, so the amendment
is applied to the wrong issue. The problem is not staffing levels, it
is the system. The Bill proposes a new system, which is the key, is it
not?
Mr.
Weir:
No, it is not. Part of the problem with the system
is that there is an insufficient number of people dealing with the
cases and struggling with a computer system that, frankly, has never
worked. Until we have a new system—as has been pointed out,
there will be three different maintenance systems running to start with
in the new CMEC—we need a lot of
people.
Paul
Rowen:
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the amendment
suggests not that staffing levels should be set in concrete but that
the commission should be allowed to set them? That is vital. We cannot
set up a new organisation, appoint people to run it, and then say
“But you cannot determine how many staff you will have.”
Nobody else would be faced with that
situation.
Mr.
Weir:
That is entirely right. The point that I am making
is that there must be sufficient staffing. That will be a matter for
the commission. If it is going to be set up properly it must have
sufficient staff.
On
voluntary agreements, it came out in the evidence-taking session that
there is no clear knowledge about how many people will use them. But
that is not my only concern; I am concerned about how they will be
monitored, which is a point that I made in the evidence-taking session.
CMEC will need to have some system for monitoring voluntary agreements.
When Lord McKenzie was asked, he said that that was a matter for the
commission, which is quite right, but there will have to be some
monitoring, and that will require staffing.
If the hon. Gentleman wishes to
press the amendment to a vote, I am minded to support it because the
last thing we need is for CMEC to get off to the same under-resourced
start as the Child Support Agency. That lack of resources was at the
root of many of its problems.
Mrs.
Dorries:
The Minister and the Department are right to
attempt to predict future staffing levels. No business or organisation
would embark on establishing an entirely new department or company
without taking that into due consideration. However, the premise on
which the staffing levels have been based anticipates that a large
number of cases will move over to a different type of system—the
voluntary arrangements. As we were told during the evidence-taking
session, parents now have an opportunity to enter into voluntary
arrangements, and 50,000 parents across the UK do so. There is no
obligation at the moment; nobody drives parents towards the Child
Support Agency. Therefore, I am not sure whether the premise on which
the staffing reductions are based is correct.
As for the words
“appropriate staffing levels” in the amendment, surely
one way to guarantee appropriate staffing levels would be to explore
further the option of a key caseworker scenario. In the evidence-taking
session we were told that the department and its lines operate for 66
or 68 hours a week. In my experience of key caseworker scenarios, that
is fine, because there is a back-up key caseworker, so two people share
one case. Parents are made aware of when their key caseworker is
working, either by e-mail or another system. It would be possible to
have appropriate staffing levels and for parents to have a better
service if they were aware of when their key caseworker would be
working and when their cases could be managed. We know that sometimes
20 or 30 people deal with a case. One person with one computer screen
dealing with one case would give better outcomes, both for parents and
staff, and may even reduce sickness levels in the
Department.
Andrew
Selous:
I shall be brief because we have had a fairly
broad debate. Looking at the wording of the amendment, I presume that
the Minister will vote for it because it
says:
“The
Commission is to be responsible for
ensuring... appropriate staffing
levels”.
Well, we all
want to see appropriate levels. He is not saying that he will keep the
staffing level at 25,000 or 10,000 but that he will ensure that there
is the right number of staff to do the job. If the amendment is pressed
to a vote it will be interesting to see how everyone votes.
We are talking about the
application of the Gershon review. If one reads what the Gershon review
was supposed to do, it was to ensure that resources go to the front
line, to free up bureaucracy, and to slim down the administrative tail
if it was too big. I think that we would all sign up to
that.
Mr.
Boswell:
I think that I am right in saying that it was
also supposed to maintain the quality of service to the
user.
Andrew
Selous:
My hon. Friend is absolutely right; the key part
of Gershon was that there would be no diminution in service delivery,
an objective that is possible. On studying the affairs of the Health
and Safety Executive recently, it came to my attention that there has
been a slight reduction in full-time equivalent construction inspectors
as a result of Gershon. That is the wrong way to do it; that is cutting
the front line. I would not have had a problem with Gershon and the
Health and Safety Executive if there had been a reduction in the back
offices or if it had merged some offices or outsourced something at the
rear of the operation. That is at the heart of the issue.
I return to the wording of the
amendment, which merely says “appropriate”. I do not
think that anyone in the Committee wants to see an inappropriate level
of staff.
It being
twenty-five minutes past Ten o’clock,
The
Chairman
adjourned the Committee without Question
put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
Adjourned till this day at
half-past One
o’clock.
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