Consultation on Child Maintenance extended to include more views

The consultation on child maintenance payments has been extended to ensure there is enough time to get a full range of views, including feedback from all relevant organisations.

Shannon Bateson, Associate Solicitor in our family law team provides an update.

The consultation was launched on 8 May 2024 by the Child Maintenance Service (CMS) to discuss ways to increase the number of children being kept out of poverty.

The proposals, put forward by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) under the previous government, include:

• Stopping the Direct Pay service and deal with all cases via Collect and Pay with CMS collecting and transferring all payments. This would allow the CMS to tackle non-compliance faster and, when necessary, take enforcement action more quickly.  

• Exploring the best way to support family-based arrangements with an enhanced calculation tool, along with signposting to conflict resolution support. 

• Asking how the CMS can better support victims of domestic or economic abuse, building on recommendations from Dr Samantha Callan’s 2023 Independent Review of the Child Maintenance Service. 

In the 12 months to March 2024, the CMS arranged over £1.4 billion in child maintenance payments and was managing 722,000 arrangements for 658,000 paying parents and 986,000 children. 

The Lords DWP Minister, Baroness Maeve Sherlock, said: “The extension of the consultation into the Child Maintenance Service will ensure that we provide the best possible opportunity to hear the concerns and thoughts of expert groups and individuals.”

The extended consultation will now close on 30 September 2024.

We shall keep clients informed of developments.

For more information about the issues raised in this article or any aspect of family law please contact Shannon on 01228 516666 or click here to send her an email.