Turner Judy: Child Support Amendment Bill (No 4) — In Committee 
Turner Judy: Child Support Amendment Bill (No 4) — In Committee 
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JUDY TURNER (Deputy Leader—United Future) 
: 
 I want to take just a brief call on this part but I say first of all that it is important to note the quality of submissions we received. I think a lot of us on the Social Services Committee discovered that aside from what this amendment tries to do the most interesting thing that came out of the submissions was the distance we in this Parliament need to go at some stage—and I hope that that is in the not too distant future—to relook completely at how we calculate liable-parent payments and the mechanisms we use for payment to take into consideration some of the concerns raised by both liable parents and custodial parents about the system as it currently exists. We need to look to other jurisdictions to see what they are doing because some really innovative things are happening overseas that we could well learn from. Other countries are further down the track in terms of the reforms they are bringing in. 
However those things being taken into consideration we do need to focus on what this amendment bill seeks to do. I agree with the Minister that although all of us have this nagging sense of injustice when we feel that people have been let off the hook my understanding from what the officials told us is that something like half of liable parents are currently in arrears. This is a problem that for some is getting bigger and bigger. Some of them are in the situation where the debt is just not recoverable. They have got themselves into such a pickle financially that the tendency to walk away from responsibility becomes a great temptation. What this amendment bill is trying to do is to reconnect liable parents with their responsibilities and with the department so they can pick up their responsibilities and start paying once again and to remove the barriers that would stop them doing that. 
I share the concern that we are encouraging indebtedness and encouraging a reckless attitude towards being a liable parent. However at the same time we have large numbers of parents who are already in big trouble many of whom would like now to pick up their responsibilities as their situation has changed but are very nervous and anxious about the amount of debt they will have to service. When the interest they now owe is larger than the principal we are into a bit of a nonsense. We are happy to support this bill. 
I think it is worth noting the changes to Part 1 that the Social Services Committee has put forward. Firstly we wanted to ensure that the mandatory write-offs of incremental penalties relate to the exact amount. There was this potential prior to the work of the select committee that a person who had his or her debt written off could end up in credit in a way that is obviously not helpful. We have changed clause 32 and put a new formula in place so that cannot happen. There is also an allowance for the offsetting of child support payments to be automated where both parents are liable for child support and one parent is in receipt of a social security benefit. That new technology is now available to the Inland Revenue Department it can now start to use it and I think that is helpful and positive. We have also included an ability to ensure that living allowances are inflation adjusted. Those are some very positive things. 
Much of what submitters put before us that also needs addressing did not fall within the framework of this amendment bill but as I said earlier they are fodder for thought. I hope that all social service spokespeople and committees within different caucuses will start to look very seriously at this. I think we all need to be of the mind to see some reforms in this area—certainly United Future is.