Today's news that the Government will take away the passports and driving licences of non resident parents without going to Court leads me to pose this question. The whole organisation seems to cost as much to run as it collects. So I struggle to see any sense in its existence at all.
While it seems one of those ideas that's good in principle, in practice no-one seems happy with the CSA, everyone involved with it seems to hate it with bitter emotion and the whole thing offers no value whatsoever. Is it just me or is the CSA is complete disaster from start to finish? Would we be better off simply scrapping the thing? I'd be genuinely interested to know what people think.
Let me explain a bit more. In Dover & Deal it's a big issue people ask me to help with. I see lots of fathers who tell me the CSA applies for earnings deduction orders equal to the maximum of 40% net pay as a matter of course, without any apparent view to affordability or outgoings. There is no Court oversight here - they can just take the deductions from employers by administrative order. I have lost count of the number of people who tell me the CSA routinely loses correspondence (they rarely reply to any letter I send to them), changes it's position on arrears payment agreements without any consideration to circumstances and generally acts in a high handed manner. And unlike Court process, these deduction orders stand pending appeal and can cause real hardship. Giving the CSA the ability to take passports and driving licences without Court sanction is likely to increase the bitterness.
Then I see mothers who tell me that rogue fathers duck and dive, hide up their NI numbers so they cannnot easily be traced, pay nothing at all and the CSA are ineffectual at getting hold of them or the person dealing with the case has gone on sick leave / holiday and nothing happens etc etc. So no-one is happy and with the whole thing costing as much as it collects, I wonder whether we should look at the old system we had, improve this system or adopt a new and different system?
