General Chat

I was married & had to have fertility treatment and when i was 5 months pregnant my husband left i have never had full maintenance off him and now i have met someone else he has taken redundancy and i hardly have anything off him. I have never stopped him seeing his son but it seems as though because he can see him when he wants its when he can be bothered. For example not turning up or he has a headache or when he was working he had stocktake at work I rang his work once and there was no stocktake!!

I deliberately used the word 'Championed' not 'Introduced' ......! It was Gordon's meddling that contributed to many of the CSA's problems and especially the heartache it caused to those responsible parents who were quite willing to co-operate.

When it comes to support, both parents are equally responsible. Absenteeism is irellevant. Where a parent is paying an agreed amount as support then there is no need for any CSA involvement whatsoever. Access, on the other hand does also need to be addressed too, so can't be excluded from the debate.

Hi Suzanne,
Seems like the CSA has finally realised they're not the great 'I am' they thought they were when they first started!!! (I'm talking over 20 years ago)
I'm glad your son gets to see his son, and he and the childs mother are on good terms.
My daughter has a daughter by a man who isn't her husband. That sounds bad - she had a relationship, they had a baby ,split up and daughter has since married another man and has 2 sons by him.
I suggested the CSA were kept out if possible-and they've managed it.
My grand daughter regularly sees her father - and her other half brother that her father's partner has had.

Talking of Father's day - my daughter had to buy cards and presents for 7 fathers today.
One from grand daughter to her biological father, another one for her stepfather, one from her 2 boys to their father, one from her OH to his father, one from OH his mother's partner, and one for her father!!! :-S

Bet she's glad I live alone!! :-D

HI MAGGIE,
my son pays towards his sons keep without the csa.my son is working and his sons mother works part time,they had a stupid one night stand after a party.my son adores his son,he buys all his clothes shoes and nappies and his son stays with him 3times a wk.all xmas presents are shared as well as birthday presents,my son got lots of lovely fathers day gifts today from his son,bought by his sons mother and my son does the same for mothers day and birthdays.my son and my grandsons mother do not have a relationship,but they stay friends for the sake of their beautiful son.x

maggiewinchester

I too had a court order the CSA only got involved when I wasn't able to work and was on benefits, unfortunately once you had gone through the CSA I don't think you could remove yourself when you got a job.

I also believe that you don't have to involve the CSA now unless on benefits, some of my daughters friends have young children and get on well with the fathers, the fathers contribute no CSA involved, mind you the mothers work.

I am sure some will tell you if this is wrong.

I am sorry to hear that Rita, I hope your grandson gets to see his son as often as possible, and stay in touch in other ways in between visits.

Rose xx

I agree Teresa, I don't think there's anything wrong with stigmatising crap parents by other people but it government policy just isn't right and won't work

well if the CSA are going to charge people
they better get their fingers out
and do a proper job instead of the balls up they have made of it
from the start
maybe they should be paid on how good they do the job
my guess is they would then

have to pay the public for their servises not the other way round

i know people who have never had a penny for their kids
and the CSA fail to chase up the absent parents
when the tax office or benifits office could do this so easy
about time the government departments worked together

I wasn't charged Teresa, perhaps the charge was put against the parent without care of the child?

The charge is nothing new, the original CSA charged for their services.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=2986366

CSA...Our charging proposals

23. For parents who choose to enter the statutory scheme a charge will be applied to the applicant. This will encourage the parent to try and reach a family-based arrangement. The charge, in return for the delivery of a statutory service application, will ensure all applicants have considered at the gateway whether they are able to make a collaborative family-based arrangement instead. This is a central part of our reforms to ensure the child maintenance system supports active choices that will move parents to the right arrangements for them and their children.

25. We are still considering the level of charges but are looking at the following range to balance fairness to individuals with value for money for the taxpayer:
? An upfront application charge of around £100.
? A total application charge for parents on benefits in the range of £50 with £20 of this paid upfront and the remainder paid in instalments. The instalments for the application only become payable where maintenance is in payment. Therefore a
parent on benefit who applies will never pay more than the upfront charge if no maintenance is received from the application.
? A charge of £20–£25 for the calculation only service.

There was a guy I used to work with who split from his wife when she had an affair, but decided that as she was staying in the marital home, his little boy would be better off there in familiar surroundings, same school etc etc. Maintenance was agreed by the courts during the divorce, and he duly paid. Access was agreed every other weekend, which he happily adhered to....but it wasn't long before she was forced to go along with the CSA, who then told him he had to pay £400 a month!
I was on the same wage, and lucky to make £650 a month basic...this was in the late '90s....
Because he simply couldn't afford that, she started making all sorts of excuses not to let him see his little boy, to avoid the fortnightly access, and it was pretty soon that he didn't see him at all. He was devastated and had a breakdown through it all. Yet without the interference of the CSA as it was back then, they would have been quite happy to plod along the way they were.
Now Cameron wants people like him to be stigmatised?

As I said earlier in this thread, it's not as simple as that, each case is different. It's not black and white, there are miles of grey areas in between. Blanket policies simply won't work fairly.

Going back to the parent with the child(ren) having to pay the CSA to make a claim.
Does this mean parents are now allowed to have agreements without the CSA being involved?
Years ago, when ex & I got (amicably) divorced, we had a financial agreement that was backed by the court.
When the CSA arrived, I was offered 'help' by them, which I refused , as we had made arrangements that were backed up by a court order.
I was then told they HAD to be involved, and their harrassment of my ex, caused a rift between us, and him to have a nervous breakdown!!
He went off to the outback of Australia, I lost 6 weeks worth of benefit a year as I couldn't tell them exactly where he was living. I also wouldn't lie for them and accuse him of being violent, and say I was frightened of him (a cop-out that meant I didn't have to have anything else to do with him, and the CSA didn't have to 'chase' him - good for their statistics, apparently)
Very good for our children - NOT.

Oh- and had I lied for the CSA's benefit, my ex wouldn't be be able to be doing the very worthwhile job he now does of teaching special needs teenagers,

Gwynne, that's good for you. I've seen the long term devastation caused to fathers whose children have cut off all relations with them and it's a terrible thing to see. Sad for the children too.

Rose, to answer your question - yes why not stigmatise bad parents?

I don't think stigmatising them will do a blind bit of good, Rose. If they feel no sense of obligation to support a child they brought into the world name-calling won't help.

If an absent parent doesn't want a relationship with a child and doesn't send cards or see the child then I still believe that he or she should pay towards the child's upkeep and not be allowed to walk away with no responsibility.

If the absent parent can't pay that's a different matter, I didn't think that was what we were discussing, I was talking about those who won't pay.

Gwynne

Sorry I am out of synch with all the posts now,

But I repeat what will "stigmatising" actually do to the relationship between child and runaway parent?

Will it improve it? will it suddenly make "runaway" parents have a metamorphosis into caring responsible parents willing to pay maintenance ( for a child that is quite likely to be calling someone else 'daddy' by then).

And sometimes I think financial arrangements are focused on at the expense of the child anyway, it isn't JUST about the money from the child's viewpoint!, it is about the birthday card that doesn't come, the letter once in a while that makes the child feel that daddy still cares even if he can't be in the child's life, or have the money to support him/her.

Stigmatising men who don't want to pay, or actually can't , won't help the child or the relationship ... making it easy for a father to have some contact, even from a distance, without it being dependent on his cheque book just might be more beneficial to the child whilst giving the father a reason to WANT to contribute financially , for a child he knows and who knows him, who calls him, and not the latest man, 'daddy' .

In my opinion a child is for life and both parents should pay towards the upkeep regardless of who is at fault for any split.

The parents are usually adults and should act like it, support could range from a weekly/monthly payment or just the buying of school clothes once a year, I know I would have been more than happy if my ex had paid for school clothes once a year, in fact he never paid neither did he come and see them except for two 15 minute visits every year, did he live miles away no 100 yards.

The "children" are now adults, both brought up by me and my 2nd husband the same way, one has seen her biological father a couple of times and has decided she does not want to anymore as even now he couldn't make the effort to come and see her she had to do all the running, the other doesn't want to, his reply he never bothered when we were young so why should we now and anyway (OH) is my father.

Must just add I did eventually get money (not a lot just over £2000) but it was two years ago and the children were 25 and 22 apparently CSA keep debt open until it is paid and that was for 15 years.


My rant over.......

I will add here, that there are some absent parents, who actually don't want anything more to do with their children, and it is those who should be targetted to be forced to contribute toward the upbringing of their own children, but what percentage of all cases are those ones in particular? It would be nice to get things in a proper perspective before tarring everyone with the same brush.

I can see your point, Uggers, but quite often it's the tax payer who pays.

Absent parents do have recourse to the law if access is unjustifiably witheld. I don't know of many such cases among people I know, mostly both want to do what is best for the child.

Gwynne