Child Support Act

EDM number 36 in 1995-96, proposed by Liz Lynne on 15/11/1995.

That this House, while firmly supporting the principle that parents should honour their obligations to their children, no longer believes that the best interests of children are served by the Child Support Act 1991; notes that the report Losing Support, commissioned by NSPCC and four other children's charities, concluded that the Child Support Act had done nothing to improve the well-being of children in lone parent families and that, in some cases, the distress and material losses which were experienced by a number of children were damaging; notes further that the Act is harming the creation of new and viable family units; notes that in addition the Agency is less efficient at the collection of maintenance than the Liable Relatives Unit that it replaced and is incapable of producing prompt and accurate maintenance assessments and that for these and other reasons believes the Child Support Act has lost the confidence of the country; and therefore calls upon the Government to repeal the Act, return on a temporary basis tothe previous court system for the settlement of maintenance issues, revive the Liable Releatives Unit and then consult widely on the best way to implement a comprehensive family court system which will allow genuine consistency across all matters of family policy, flexibility into maintenance assessment and foster co-operation between the parties to the benefit of all concerned.

This motion has been signed by a total of 30 MPs, 1 of these signatures have been withdrawn.