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21 July 2009 : Column 1269W—continued
In reply to your recent Parliamentary Question about the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission, the Secretary of State promised a substantive reply from the Child Maintenance Commissioner.
You asked the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department has (a) commissioned and (b) reviewed recent research on the effect of the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission and its predecessor agency on the recovery of child maintenance payments from non-resident parents. [281843]
The Commission publishes a quarterly Summary of Statistics which contains a full range of statistical information assessing the impact of the Child Support Agency on the recovery of child maintenance. The latest copy is available in the House of Commons library or online at:
In addition, in 2007 the Child Support Agency commissioned research to better understand the client experience, and the issues and service that clients believe need to be improved. This research was published in February 2008 as the DWP Research Report: No 471 CSA Client Insight Research 2007. The Agency also commissioned two reports on the use of deduction from earnings orders in the collection of child maintenance; DWP Research Reports 520 and 530.
The Department for Work and Pensions commissioned the Relationship and Separation survey in 2008, DWP Research Report 503, to inform the changes to the system of child maintenance which led to the introduction of the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission. This report focuses on the number and form of child maintenance arrangements in place, demographic information about the child maintenance population, past and future use of information and support, views on the changes to the child support system and likely behaviour as a result of these.
There have also been extensive reports conducted by DWP in the past on compliance levels, the effects of maintenance direct and international perspectives on child support.
Full details of all the Departments research reports are published online at the following link:
The Commission has begun its own programme of research, measurement and evaluation to provide robust measures of the impact of such services provided by the Commission, on our clients, as well as to understand more about the attitudes, behaviours, service needs and expectations of its current and potential future clients.
We will continue to work on increasing our understanding and knowledge of external research, and programmes are in place internally to provide an ongoing appraisal of the research landscape.
I hope you find this answer helpful.
Jo Swinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what procedures are in place for obtaining child maintenance payments from a non-resident parent who has no permanent contact address. [288296]
Helen Goodman: The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission is responsible for the child maintenance system. I have asked the Child Maintenance Commissioner to write to the hon. Member, with the information requested and I have seen the response.
In reply to your recent Parliamentary Question about child maintenance, the Secretary of State promised a substantive reply from the Child Maintenance Commissioner.
You asked the Secretary of State for the Department for Work and Pensions, what procedures are in place for obtaining child maintenance payments from a non-resident parent who has no permanent contact address. [288296]
The lack of a permanent address is not necessarily a barrier to the assessment and collection of child maintenance. If a non-resident parent can be contacted by telephone the information needed to carry out a maintenance calculation will be gathered by telephone and a contact address is not needed. If the non-resident parent has an employer correspondence can be sent via the employer. The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission has several means which it can use to trace those non-resident parents who are evading their financial responsibilities, including contacting the DVLA, the Prison Location Service and credit reference agencies. The small numbers of cases where the non-resident parent can not be traced are kept under review and the child maintenance liability does not come to an end.
The lack of a permanent address is also not a barrier to the collection of child maintenance in many cases. Where the non-resident parent is in receipt of benefit, a contribution to maintenance can be taken from the benefit without a permanent contact address. Similarly if a non resident parent is in employment, maintenance can be deducted direct from wages. Maintenance can also be paid by direct debit or standing order as well as by cheque or cash.
I hope you find this answer helpful.
David Taylor: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions whether the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission will take account of tax credits in its calculation of non-resident parents' income from 2011; and if she will make a statement. [288613]
Helen Goodman: The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission is responsible for the child maintenance system. I have asked the Child Maintenance Commissioner to write to the hon. Member with the information requested and I have seen the response.
In reply to your recent Parliamentary Question about Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission, the Secretary of State promised a substantive reply from the Child Maintenance Commissioner.
You asked the Secretary of State for the Department for Work and Pensions, whether the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission will take account of tax credits in its calculation of non-resident parents' income from 2011; and if she will make a statement. [288613]
Tax Credits will no longer be taken into account in the calculation of non-resident parent's income from 2011 as a consequence of the move from net income to gross income.
The White Paper proposed that tax credits should no longer be included in the calculation of a non-resident parent's gross weekly income. It stated (at paragraph 4.17) "It would not be appropriate for a liability to be based on a combination of tax credits that are currently being received and income from a previous period. Including tax credits from the previous year would complicate, rather than simplify, the way in which maintenance is assessed. Accordingly, and to reduce the complexity of administrative arrangements, we have concluded that tax credits should no longer be included as income."
The Government has committed to move to using information supplied by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), which will make maintenance calculations in the future scheme faster, more accurate and enable a more transparent process. HMRC taxable income information supplied to the Commission will largely derive from employers' end of year PAYE returns and from individual taxpayers' self-assessment returns. Neither data source will include tax credits as they do not form part of taxable income.
The Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission is continuing to work with HMRC to decide how to make best use of this information and the outcome of this work will be reflected in a detailed definition of the income measure to be used in the maintenance calculation. This will be included in a set of affirmative
regulations, which will be introduced for parliamentary scrutiny in advance of the planned start date of 2011 for the future scheme.
I hope you find this answer helpful.
David Taylor: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what recent representations she has received on the adjustment of child maintenance payments to take account of a reduction in the working hours of a non-resident parent. [288643]
Helen Goodman: Child maintenance assessments are based on the income of a non-resident parent rather than their working hours. I have responded recently to a parliamentary question on this subject raised by the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) in which I confirmed that the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission routinely re-assesses child maintenance liability once a non-resident parent informs them of a reduction in their working hours which has reduced their income.
Cold Weather Payments
Mr. Vara: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many cold weather payments have been made as a result of temperatures reported by each weather station in each year since such payments were first made; and which weather stations cover each constituency. [277853]
Helen Goodman: Information on the estimated number of cold weather payments made for each weather station in Great Britain in 1999-2000 and each year from 2001-02 has been placed in the Library. (Information for other years is not available).
A list of the weather stations linked to each parliamentary constituency in Great Britain for winter 2008-09 has been placed in the Library.
Council Tax Benefits: Essex
Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many households in (a) Essex and (b) Castle Point receive 100 per cent. council tax benefit. [282062]
Helen Goodman: The information is not available in the format requested.
Crisis Loans
John Penrose: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many crisis loans decision-makers are in post; and how many she expects to be in post by May 2010. [285436]
Jim Knight: The administration of Jobcentre Plus is a matter for the acting chief executive of Jobcentre Plus, Mel Groves. I have asked him to provide the hon. Member with the information requested.
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your question asking how many Crisis Loan decision makers are in post; and how many she expects to be in post by May 2010. This is something which falls within the responsibilities delegated to me as Acting Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus.
Since January 2009 we have seen increases in Crisis Loan applications and for the past five months they have averaged around 279,000 per month. Therefore, a decision was made to increase the number of Crisis Loan decision makers. We now have 1800 Crisis Loan decision makers taking calls with a further 200 expected to be fully operational by the end of September.
Across Jobcentre Plus we are currently recruiting staff into customer service operational roles to ensure we are able to deal with current increases in workload. We continuously review staffing levels on this basis therefore I am unable to say how many Crisis Loan decision makers are expected to be in post in May 2010.
Crisis Loans Line
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (1) what steps she is taking to increase the proportion of calls made to the Crisis Loans Line which are answered; and how many calls the line (a) received and (b) answered in the latest period for which figures are available; [287983]
(2) what steps she is taking to increase the number of telephone calls to the Crisis Loans Line which are answered. [284942]
Helen Goodman: Jobcentre Plus does not have a single Crisis Loan call line. There are 20 Crisis Loan Benefit Delivery Centres nationally, each with their own dedicated 0800 telephone number and we do not have robust statistical information on a national level.
In March 2008 Jobcentre Plus had 900 Crisis Loan decision makers answering telephones and making decisions in the 20 Benefit Delivery Centres that handle applications for Crisis Loans. Crisis Loan applications have more than doubled since October 2006, (taking us to an average of 220,000 applications per month at the end of 2008) and plans were put in place to deploy an extra 700 staff from our Contact Centre Directorate. This work was completed in April 2009 and enabled us to answer more calls first time.
However, we have seen further increases in Crisis Loan applications since January 2009 and for the past five months they have averaged around 279,000 per month. Therefore, a decision was made to increase the number of our Crisis Loan decision makers even further. We now have 1,800 Crisis Loan decision makers taking calls with a further 200 expected to be fully operational by the end of September.
This will enable Jobcentre Plus to answer more calls first time.
Debts: Advisory Services
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what financial support her Department provided to debt counselling agencies in the latest year for which figures are available. [283243]
Helen Goodman: My Department does not currently provide financial support to debt counselling agencies. However, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is providing funding of approximately £28 million in 2009-10 for the face-to-face debt advice project.
Departmental Accountancy
Steve Webb: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions when she plans to publish her Department's resource accounts for 2008-09. [287295]
Jim Knight: The Department's resource accounts for 2008-09 are due to be laid before the House on Monday 20th July 2009. This will be a typeset version of the account, with a published version being made available by The Stationery Office during August 2009 (exact date yet to be confirmed).
This is the third year in succession that the Department will have laid its resource accounts before the recess.
Departmental Conditions of Employment
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what percentage of employees in her Department are on a flexible working contract. [287106]
Jim Knight: The information is as follows.
At the end of May 2009, 33 per cent. (36,037) of employees in the Department for Work and Pensions were on part-time flexible working contracts.
Flexible contracts are only one of a range of flexible working arrangements including flexible working patterns that are available to DWP employees. DWP also promotes flexibility through home working and job sharing.
Employees are made aware of civil service wide job sharing opportunities through a direct link to the civil service online job-share notice board, hosted on the civil service website.
Departmental Consultants
Geraldine Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how much her Department spent on consultants in 2009. [288469]
Jim Knight: The Department has spent £9.7 million on management consultants in the three months from January to March 2009, the latest period for which validated figures are available. This represents a 49 per cent. reduction on the equivalent period in 2008.
Departmental Contracts
Lorely Burt: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many contracts let by her Department were awarded to businesses with fewer than 50 employees in each of the last five years; and what the monetary value of such contracts was in each such year. [287809]
Jim Knight: The information requested is not collated centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Departmental Databases
Jenny Willott: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (1) which of the planned databases that will be managed by her Department or one of its agencies and which will hold personal information on members of the public are expected to become operational in each of the next five years; and if she will make a statement; [286149]
(2) what categories of personal information on members of the public will be held on each of her
Department's and its agency's databases expected to become operational in the next five years; what estimate she has made of the likely number of individuals' details each such database will hold when fully operational; and if she will make a statement. [286500]
Jim Knight: The Department intends that one new database (known as CAMLite) will become operational during this period. CAMLite will enable improvements in the delivery of services so that customer requirements can be handled more effectively and efficiently, and it will record every contact with a customer. When fully operational, CAMLite is expected to hold details of around 7 million customers.
The categories of personal information that the database is expected to contain will comply with the Department's formal registration under the Data Protection Act.
Following the publication of the cross-Government data handling review in June 2008, privacy impact assessments are conducted where new IT systems hold significant amounts of personal data.
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