300.Some arrears of maintenance will normally accrue after the start-date for liability but before a maintenance assessment has been made. However, in recognition of the significant backlogs that developed in the early years of the CSA, the 1995 Child Support White Paper Improving Child Support (Cm 2745) paved the way for the CSA to introduce a scheme which allowed the Agency to agree not to enforce more than six months’ worth of arrears, providing the non-resident parent met his responsibilities for a year. After a year, the Agency makes payments to the parent with care in lieu of those she would have received had the non-resident parent paid in full.
301.The scheme was never intended to become a catch-all for individual cases of delay or maladministration. It was part of a strategy to tackle the backlogs, improve compliance and get the Agency on its feet. The scheme was not therefore translated into primary legislation, and authority for compensation payments was accordingly granted by HM Treasury on a non-statutory basis, with payments approved annually in the Appropriation Act.
302.However, the CSA did not start to clear backlogs to the expected timescales. The scheme was expanded, to include arrears arising from delayed periodic reviews (section 16 of the 1991 Act), and change of circumstance reviews (section 17 of the 1991 Act), because it was accepted that, on balance, the lack of transparency and the complexity of the current system often produced changes in maintenance assessments which were difficult for non-resident parents to predict. Because the scheme was still non-statutory, a condition of the extension was that the Government should seek legislative powers if the arrangements needed to continue further.
303.This section provides a statutory basis for continuing a scheme under which, in certain circumstances, a non-resident parent will not be required to pay the whole of the arrears of maintenance. It is intended that the circumstances should be where significant delay by the CSA has arisen under the current scheme, but only where the non-resident parent gives a commitment to meet his ongoing liabilities and pay the arrears specified in the agreement, and meets this commitment.
304.Subsection (1) provides the circumstances where this section applies. These are where the effective date of an assessment following an application or a review under the current scheme, before the introduction of the new decision-making provisions in June 1999 following the Social Security Act 1998, means that arrears have built up.
305.Subsection (2) enables the Secretary of State to apply this section to different cases of arrears from those in subsection (1), and to disapply the section to specified cases in subsection (1).
306.Subsection (3) provides the powers for an agreement between the Secretary of State and the non-resident parent, in order for the Secretary of State not to require him to pay, and not to take action to recover, the whole of the arrears in prescribed circumstances.
307.Subsection (4) provides the Secretary of State with the power to prescribe the terms of the agreement referred to in subsection (3).
308.Subsection (5) provides that the section will only apply to agreements made before 1st April 2002 and expiring before 1st April 2003.
309.Subsection (6) provides that the Secretary of State has power not to seek to recover the arrears provided the non-resident parent meets the terms of that agreement.
310.Subsection (7) provides that if the non-resident parent has complied with the agreement, then when it expires the Secretary of State may make payments to the person with care, and the non-resident parent will cease to be liable for the full amount of the arrears of maintenance.
311.Subsection (8) provides if the non-resident parent defaults under the agreement he becomes liable to pay all the outstanding arrears.
312.Subsection (9) provides the Secretary of State with the power to regulate for agreements made on or after 1st April 2002. This is subject to approval by resolution in each House of Parliament. Subsection (10) defines “prescribed”.
313.Subsections (11) and (12) concern the procedure for regulations under this section.
Part 1: Child Support. Commentary on Sections Schedule 3 Section 27: Temporary compensation payment scheme