Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 15 December 2004
78 Mr. Kenny asked the Minister for Social and Family Affairs when the last review of issues with regard to maintenance took place; when the next such review is expected, as recommended by the National Economic and Social Forum report no. 20 on lone parents; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [33509/04]
View answer100 Mr. Gogarty asked the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the way in which he intends to ensure that unmet child maintenance payments are met. [33469/04]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 78 and 100 together.
Payment of maintenance is first and foremost a private matter for the persons concerned and, if they cannot resolve the issue, for the family law courts.
Under social welfare legislation, there is a statutory obligation on spouses to maintain each other and their children and on parents to maintain their children. Applicants for one parent family payment are required to make ongoing efforts to seek adequate maintenance from their former spouses, or, in the case of unmarried applicants, the other parent of their child.
Normally, such maintenance is obtained by way of negotiation or by court order. In recent years, separated couples have been increasingly using my Department's family mediation service to resolve issues.
Since 2001, one parent family payment claimants are allowed to retain 50% of any maintenance received without reduction in their social welfare entitlements.
Where social welfare support is being provided to the one parent family, the other parent is liable to contribute to the cost of this payment. In every case where one parent family payment goes into payment, the maintenance recovery unit of my Department seeks to trace the liable relative involved in order to ascertain whether she or he is in a financial position to contribute towards the cost of one parent family payment. This follow up activity takes place within two to three weeks of award of payment.
All liable relatives assessed with maintenance liability are notified by the Department and issued with a determination order setting out the amount of contribution assessed. The Department requires regular — normally weekly — payment of the contributions assessed in this way.
The process of securing maintenance contributions from liable relatives can, however, be difficult and protracted. This is the experience of all countries with similar systems in operation.
Nonetheless, my Department has realised quite significant savings through this system. There are currently 1,835 liable relatives contributing directly to my Department. As a result of maintenance recovery unit activity, savings of €8.5 million were achieved in 2002 and €14.2 million in 2003. Savings for 2004 are estimated at €14.9 million. As a result of maintenance recovery activity in 2004 to date, a total of 646 one parent family payments were cancelled while a further 426 payments were reduced. Legislation allows the Department to seek recovery from liable relatives through the courts in appropriate cases. A total of 152 cases has been submitted for court action from 2001 to date. The majority of these cases have resulted either in orders being written against the liable relative in court or in the liable relative agreeing to pay a contribution to either my Department or the lone parent. Further cases are in the course of preparation by my Department for court action.
In its report on lone parents in July 2001 — report no. 20 — the National Economic and Social Forum recommended that the issue of maintenance should be reviewed on a regular basis.
The issue of maintenance payments to lone parents, and the issue of the Department seeking a contribution where a liable relative is not paying sufficient or indeed any maintenance, had been considered as part of my Department's programme evaluation review of the one parent family payment which published its report in September 2000.
One of the recommendations of the review was that lone parents should have an incentive to seek maintenance. This recommendation was put into effect in 2001 and allows one parent family claimants to retain 50% of any maintenance received without any reduction in their social welfare payment.
The issues with regard to maintenance recovery are reviewed by my Department on a regular basis. The maintenance recovery unit of my Department is also kept under review. There are currently 12 staff working on maintenance recovery activity with a further five staff working on follow-up maintenance recovery related work in the one parent family payment scheme.
