The administration of the Child Support Agency is a matter for the Chief Executive. He will write to the hon. Gentleman with the information requested.
Letter from Stephen Geraghty:
In reply to your recent Parliamentary questions about the Child Support Agency, the Secretary of State promised a substantive reply from the Chief Executive.
You asked the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the total is of uncollectable Child Support Agency arrears broken down by uncollectable due to (a) death (b) move abroad (c) unknown addresses (d) incorrect maintenance assessment and (e) other causes; and if he will make a statement.
The Agency is not able to provide a breakdown of uncollectable Child Support Agency arrears into the requested categories. However, following a debt analysis exercise in 2005/06, the Agency is now able to classify debt with greater clarity than in previous years.
The attached tables provide the distribution of debt by type found by the debt analysis exercise. The exercise used a sample of cases on both computer systems, and had, in total, just over £130m of probably uncollectable debt, and just over £150m of possibly uncollectable debt. The Agency decides the sample size for its Debt Analysis Exercise according to robust statistical principles. This takes full account of the relative complexity of cases on each of the main systems so that the sample is statistically valid and is representative of the Agency’s whole caseload.
The amount of debt categorised as probably uncollectable in the Agency’s Annual Report and Accounts for 2005/06 is £1.929 billion. This includes the value of suspended debt, which is classified as probably uncollectable for this exercise.
The amount of debt categorised as possibly uncollectable in the Agency’s Annual Report and Accounts for 2005/06 is £818 million, against which the provision below was made.
Tables providing a breakdown of these amounts by type are attached.
I hope this is helpful.
Debt Type Proportion (percentage) Amount(£ million) Non Resident Parent Deceased Parent with Care Deceased Last Qualifying Child Deceased 1.54 29 Reconciled (private case) Non Resident Parent terminally ill Non Resident Parent permanently abroad Non Resident Parent in receipt of State Pension 18.0 347 Unable to trace Non Resident Parent for more than 5 years 26.2 505 Benefit case with no enforced deductions in place 23.2 447 Non Resident Parent self employed—nil compliant 31.2 601 Total 100 1,929
Agency’s Debt Analysis sample exercise—Breakdown of Possibly Uncollectable ProvisionDebt TypeProportion (percentage)Amount (£ million)Unemployed student Reconciled cases1.815NRP address unknown15.2124Unable to trace NRP for between 1 and 5 years36.7300NRP on benefit, enforced deductions not in place3.025Nil compliant employed or employment status unknown30.2247Self employed NRP, nil compliant9.477Self employed NRP, partially compliant1.19Case at Enforcement Directorate for more than 1 year2.621Total100818 Notes:1. Amounts rounded to nearest £ million2. Percentages rounded to one decimal place3. The proportions are based on a sample of cases4. The amounts of debt are robust estimates calculated by applying these proportions to the full, categorised amounts of uncollectable debt