Divorced fathers to benefit from new child support rules

Divorced fathers are to be compensated for looking after their own children under Child Support Agency (CSA) rule changes that come into force today.

The new simplified system for calculating maintenance allows, for the first time, absent parents to claim discounts from the CSA when a child spends time in their care.

Family law experts say it will encourage fathers to break child contact arrangements by keeping hold of their children to enable them to pay less money to the mother. Conversely, the new formula provides a financial incentive for mothers to ignore court orders that give fathers the right to contact with their children.

The policy also appears to pit two government departments against each other. Last year, the Lord Chancellor's Department made clear it opposed linking financial payments with reform of the law regarding child contact. But the Solicitors Family Law Association, which has been consulted by the Government on the reforms, says that is exactly what the new rules, devised by the Department of Work and Pensions, will achieve.

The CSA formula is "finely geared" to the number of overnight stays. If a child, for example, stays with his or her non-resident parent for two nights of the week the amount of the assessment of child support due is reduced by almost 30 per cent.

Jane Craig, chairman of the family law association, says: "While this is intended to take into account the costs of having the child to stay, the household costs of the parent with care don't really reduce when you look at utilities and clothing etc. We fear this could lead to decisions about contact being skewed by financial concerns rather than the interests of the child."

The system is being introduced after parents said the old formula for working out contributions was too complicated to understand. Under the revised formula, a non-resident parent contributes 15 per cent of his net income to the cost of rearing one child. The amount increases to 20 per cent for two children, and 25 per cent for three or more. Where a parent has children to support in any new relationship, that is taken into account when assessing levels of child support.

Fathers' groups have already made clear they are unhappy with the new formula because it does not properly take account of the mother's income and financial position.

Single-mother groups argue that, without any improvement in the enforcement system for collecting the payment, the new rules are likely to be as ineffective as the old. Recent reports show the CSA collects only about 70 per cent of payments assessed.

The CSA, founded by the Tory government in 1993, ran into almost daily criticism because it pursued absent fathers for money without appearing to fulfil its purpose of supporting children.

Most of the fathers it contacted were already paying maintenance under court orders, and a large proportion of the money it collected went to the Treasury, by way of cuts in welfare benefits, rather than to single mothers.

The first to pay under the new system will be parents whose liability for maintenance begins on or after today. Ministers expect 30,000 cases a month to be calculated using the formula thereafter. Some absent fathers may be required to pay more but the change is designed to make their liabilities easier to calculate in advance.

Ms Craig said: "No formula is perfect and this one certainly has its faults but, overall, we think it is a step in the right direction. It will help people to see where they stand."

Steve Webb, Liberal Democrat work and pensions spokes-man, claimed 650,000 working single parents would have their child maintenance payments cut under the new system of contribution rates.