Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Families, Housing and Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011. The bill seeks to amend the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988 to achieve two objectives. Firstly, it proposes to broaden the powers of the Child Support Registrar to delegate powers to perform his or her duties under the act to persons outside the department to enhance efficiency. Secondly, it amends the number of criminal penalty provisions to ensure that the offences contained therein can be successfully prosecuted, thus achieving the object of those offences when they were initially legislated and also protecting the integrity of the Child Support Scheme.

The Child Support Scheme has identified that having the ability to outsource debt collection activity to external service providers on occasions should increase the successful collection of outstanding child support liabilities. This is similar to arrangements employed by Centrelink that that agency currently delegates to external service providers to collect outstanding liabilities in certain instances. The proposed amendments to certain criminal provisions under the act relate to the obligations of an employer when they are required by the Child Support Agency to withhold moneys from an employee to be paid to the agency when there is an outstanding child support liability. The government argues that the current offences relating to employer withholdings are somewhat ambiguous, as the offence provisions create an obligation and provide a penalty but do not specify whether the offence is created by an act or an omission. The proposed amendments will make it clear that an offence is committed when an employer fails to deduct or remit child support payments. Importantly, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions has been consulted in the making of the proposed amendments.

Child support is an important part of our system of supporting children following the breakdown of relationships, and we can no doubt rely even more on child support in the future. Why, might we ask? It is quite simple. The Gillard Labor government has ripped some $50 million out of family relationships services. Services in place to support parents and kids and help families stay together have been hit hard by a weak and directionless government—in this case, those $50 million coming from family relationships centres and also from the important work of marriage counselling in Australia.

Family relationships services are important. They play an important role in preventing relationship breakdowns and in keeping families together. When you take $50 million out of that system, a cut that will hit those families beginning on 1 July this year, people will suffer, families will suffer and, regrettably, kids will suffer. Helping families stay together is important. Instead, Labor spends more time and energy on what happens after the relationship has broken down. And, of course, the Greens do not seem to have any positive policies on this. It is a regret that the government has trillions of dollars to spend, yet a relatively small amount of money is not being spent on such important services so far as many families are concerned.

The coalition will not oppose this bill in the House. These seem to be technical and mechanical measures that will make the operation of the agency and the Child Support Scheme more efficient.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I speak in support of the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011. At common law, a parent owed no duty to provide financial support for a child that was enforceable by court action. However, statute law has long intervened to create a civil liability for financial support of children by parents that is enforceable by court action. The previous speaker was criticising us about legislation, actions and funding in respect of families. Well, long on the watch of the coalition was child maintenance—what we call child support—almost a voluntary measure. It took the election of a federal Labor government, the Whitlam Labor government, in the mid-seventies to ensure that the Family Law Act 1975 established a duty to maintain a child and created the legal obligation to pay child maintenance. The Family Law Act is now constrained by section 66E of that act, which says effectively that, if a person wishes to apply for child support, they need to apply for an administrative assessment of child support under the Child Support (Assessment) Act 1989.

The 1970s and 1980s were a time of dramatic change in Australia. The economy was internationalised by the Hawke and Keating Labor governments. There were massive changes in the way people worked and in family life generally. There was a dramatic increase in divorce. Divorce increased from 10,000 in the mid-1970s to about 40,000 in the mid-1980s. About 50,000 dependent children were affected by their parents' divorce. There was a dramatic increase in the number of single parents receiving what are now called Centrelink payments. In 1974, the total number was 183,000; in 1985, it was 316,000.

These problems mainly occurred on the watch of the coalition governments, all through the Menzies, Holt and Gorton periods and mainly through the period of Fraser. It took a federal Labor government to bring in the Family Law Act, and it took a federal Labor government to bring in the Child Support (Assessment) Act and the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act. So it was Labor governments that built the progressive reforms in family law and child support, and the coalition who have always behaved with inertia, inaction and idleness when it comes to family law reform—except when they want to pander to the men's rights groups, when they do things that they think will be electorally popular. The result of the voluntary payment of maintenance, or what we call child support these days, led to a reduction in the standard of living of children in single-parent households. It meant that taxpayers increased their payments for single-parent pensions, a very big impost on the public purse.

This government has been committed to making sure that parents fulfil what the legislation describes as their primary obligation under the Family Law Act and the Child Support (Assessment) Act, which is to pay for the maintenance of their children—that is, to pay for their basic needs, their accommodation, their clothing, their school expenses, their food and other recreational activities which incur impost. As at 31 December 2010, over 77 per cent of all children in domestic active cases received about 100 per cent of their child support. That is a significant improvement on when the Howard coalition government was on the benches. The number of children receiving 100 per cent of their child support has steadily increased every year since Labor came to power in November 2007. The federal Labor government collected $1.19 billion in the last financial year for the children of separated parents. That is money that parents pay to maintain their children in a separated situation. It is money that they, not the taxpayers, pay. So a strong, good regulatory system which compels parents to fulfil their financial obligations is good for government operation and it is good for taxpayers generally, because parents have a primary responsibility to do that.

The legislation that is before the House is really quite technical and minor in many ways, but it is in accordance with the reformist nature of this and previous federal Labor governments. The Child Support Agency was established in 1988 to administer the Australian government's Child Support Scheme, which it does by a number of pieces of legislation. Originally of course the Child Support Agency was part of the Australian Taxation Office but, I think correctly, it was transferred to the Department of Family and Community Services, which is now known as the Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs. FaHCSIA currently has responsibility for the Child Support Agency.

The legislation here today deals with only a couple of changes. The first aspect is the outsourcing of the child support debt collection activities. The new arrangement will enable the registrar of the Child Support Agency to delegate powers to persons outside the Department of Human Services. The registrar could use external providers to engage in debt collection. Governments are not always the best at collecting debts, and sometimes there are private providers who have skills, talents and expertise in certain debt collection activities which could lead to more successful identification and collection of outstanding child support debt. Centrelink has undertaken to collect outstanding liabilities. The Department of Human Services is moving to an integrated model with various agencies and now has responsibility for the child support portfolio. I think that is a credible way to go. It means more efficient collection and, if it means that we can avail ourselves of greater opportunities to outsource and allow Child Support Agency staff who were hitherto engaged in those collection activities to be engaged in other aspects, that is important. I think it would also result potentially in the Child Support Agency reducing its administrative and operational costs. There also needs to be safe security clearances for these external agencies and I am pleased that that is proposed as well.

The second matter that this legislation deals with relates to amendments of criminal provisions in the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act. In any criminal matter—and I used to practice in family law extensively but have a background, from my early time as a lawyer, practising in criminal law—there has got to be physical elements of an offence. An offence is created by an act or an omission. There is a degree of ambiguity in the legislation. I agree with the office of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions which has advised the Child Support Agency that it would be reluctant to prosecute under section 46 of the act, which deals with an employer who fails to withhold salary or wages of a paying parent.

That creates some real problems. When an employer gets notified by the Child Support Agency that the agency needs to collect child support by withholding that support from the wages of the potential payer who has a registrable liability under the Child Support (Assessment) Act and the employer does nothing about that, there is no sanction that can be enforced against that employer and the integrity of the scheme comes into doubt. That might sound strange. Are we really punishing the employer? Governments of both persuasions have been involved in supporting this type of legislation.

In very small arrangements where there are often corporate structures involving someone who could be an employee as well as a director and a shareholder of a company, or someone who could be working for a brother, sister, mother or father, or indeed someone who could be working in a small enterprise—and there are about 2.4 million of those in the country—the employee could say to his employer, Joe Bloggs: 'Do not comply. Are you being notified by the Child Support Agency? Do not withhold my wages. Pay it to me. Nothing is going to happen to you. They will not prosecute you.' Joe Bloggs, the employer, says: 'If nothing is going to happen, I want Bill Brown, my valued employee, to be happy. He needs the money himself.' The employer does not see that he has any responsibility, so he says: 'I am not going to pay it. I am not going to hand it over to the Child Support Agency under the registration and collection legislation.'

The consequences of no sanction to that employer means that the whole integrity of the scheme breaks down and the payee—usually a mum, but not always, who may have a couple of kids—does not get paid. The consequences of that are, firstly, we as taxpayers foot the bill for the operation of a scheme that is ineffectual and, secondly, we pay the bill because we end up having to pay more from social security payments to the mum who has got responsibility for the kids.

So the amendments really are a practical way to make the scheme operate better. Making sure that there are elements of an offence here that the Director of Public Prosecutions can identify which needs to be prosecuted if someone fails to comply with the legislation is really important. There are amendments in relation to a number of sections of the legislation and, in those circumstances, they make it clear to an employer that if they fail to comply with a proper notice—it is a legal notice I have seen plenty of times in my years practising as a lawyer and plenty of times clients have come to see me and I have always told the employer to comply with the legislation—to deduct or remit those child support payments they have committed an offence and can be prosecuted. If that is the case, and they realise there are consequences for their actions, they are more likely to comply. It will improve the prospects of a successful prosecution and it will improve the integrity of the whole scheme.

I am pleased to support this legislation. It is another demonstration of a federal Labor government that wants reform in the system that we know as the Child Support Scheme in this country. It yet again builds on the amendments that we have had a long history of committing to: of reform in family law and in child support, about which those opposite have often had a certain ambiguity and inertia.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise to support the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011. These are two common-sense sets of amendments to what is often a difficult and fraught area of social policy—namely, the collection of moneys from the separated parent who has obligations to provide financial support for their children through the Child Support Program.

The first cluster of amendments in the bill allows the Child Support Registrar to delegate some powers and functions to non-government or external service providers. Obviously, those will be carefully vetted and expert in their functioning. Most specifically this could mean, for example, that outstanding child support payments could be collected using specialists in debt collection. Given that there is a serious problem for the supported parent and children when child support payments are not made or are very late, it is hoped that there will be better and more timely rates of child support moneys collected using specialists or expertise drawn from the private sector.

There are already a number of other agencies, such as Centrelink, who use specialists when it comes to debt collection. The outsourcing of money collection to specialists in the field should also give the child support agencies more time to focus on their core business. We would hope that that core business includes how to maintain everything in the best interests of the child and, in particular, how to ensure that relationships between parents are not causing a great deal of stress—more than is necessary—to the children.

The second group of amendments in this bill relates to some criminal provisions under the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988. In some circumstances, an employer is required to withhold an amount from the paying parent's salary, or wages, on behalf of the Child Support Agency. The current wording of the act is ambiguous and leaves some questions about whether the offence is created by an act or omission. The proposed amendments will make it absolutely clear that an offence is committed by an employer if he or she fails to undertake certain actions as directed by the CSA—for example, the withholding of an employee's salary or the remission of those moneys to the Child Support Agency. Of course, those moneys are then directed to the needs of the children.

Both these clusters of amendments are aimed at ensuring children are properly supported by their separated parents. The coalition therefore supports these amendments. But we are not saying that is the end of the business when it comes to best practice in ensuring that, after separating parents go their different ways, their children's needs are best met. There are other concerns about the integrity of the Child Support Program. For example, electorate offices like mine are regularly contacted by distressed parents who claim that their ex-partners have declared no income or that they are unemployed after they have left their salaried employment or have converted their salaried employment to 'work for cash' payments or to some in-kind payment instead of a salary. This leaves the supporting partner with considerably reduced or no liabilities, according to the law. The CSA needs to be more proactive in investigating any such allegations to ensure that these practices do not occur and that the children are not the victims of a further failure by an obligated parent to support the children.

In some occupations, for example the Defence Reserves, the income earned is tax free. So, again, a supporting parent may appear to have no capacity to help pay for their children's upkeep—that is, no salary or income officially—but, in fact, they are earning. There is also often contention and arguments surrounding what is claimed to be just or affordable when one or both parents repartner and have more children in a new family. These not uncommon complications can lead to great distress that affects the original children's sense of wellbeing or even their capacity to have a properly funded education, clothing or health services provided. The CSA must have the appropriate legislative tools and information to ensure that all children's needs remain the focus of government actions.

Unfortunately, there is also a not uncommon problem where a grandparent—and it is almost always the grandmother—is supporting and maintaining children after the parents' relationship has broken down. Supporting parent benefits or Child Support Agency payments are not necessarily automatically diverted to the children being cared for or being raised in the grandparent's household. The grandparent is often reluctant to report her need for financial support to the CSA or to Centrelink because she knows that she may do so at the expense of her daughter's direct payments and this daughter may in fact threaten to relocate the children back into a very unstable or unsatisfactory environment rather than see her parenting payments diverted to the real carer, the grandmother.

These are just some of the very complex problems and difficulties associated with ensuring children are always the best served by our systems and legislation. We also have to make sure that the supporting parents are best able to make decisions and are able to afford to meet the needs of their children as they grow. It is therefore very unfortunate that funding for family relationship centres and services and marriage guidance counselling was cut in this budget by some $50 million. We see that as very short sighted. Quite obviously it is better to help parents sort out relationship difficulties before they lead to a separated situation, with children's needs then having to be met in two separate households. We are very concerned about that loss of some $50 million, and we ask that this government reconsider that budget action.

In relation to the bill under discussion, we support these two clusters of amendments and we ask that the government not take its eye off this issue of how to best ensure children's financial needs are met by separated parents. There is certainly a lot of unfinished business in this most complex area of social policy and legislation.

Chris Hayes (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also express my support for the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011. This legislation effectively makes two necessary changes to the child support system. It is odd that I get to speak in support of a bill like this having only yesterday celebrated my 35th wedding anniversary and all the joys that go with that—and it is all joy. But, unfortunately, one in three marriages in this country end up in divorce. Apply that to the current generation—I have three children, and we have been through the very objective that this legislation provides for with my youngest son, Jonathan. I know a broken relationship becomes a very emotional time for everybody, with the hurt and the feeling that money is being given to an ex-partner, but as grandparents of young Kiarni we have to get my son to understand we are providing for his daughter, and the biological mother is the person who is fundamentally looking after the child. The child is still entitled to all the love and care that she would have had if they were still in a relationship, and the child is entitled to participate in all the good fortune that he has in his subsequent endeavours, whether it be business or other things.

It was an interesting experience for me as a parent to go through that with a son who obviously was quite upset and emotional at the time. One thing I can stand back and look at is what is good for my granddaughter. Fortunately, that is all past and the emotions and everything else have been equalised, and there is a good working relationship between the former partners. Both sides are cooperating with, as I say, the best interests of my granddaughter in mind. So it is with mixed feelings that I make this presentation tonight.

The Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act was passed over two decades ago, and since then we have seen a steady growth in child support obligations. This amendment bill is just another example of our addressing the need to reform. It is well documented that children from broken homes already face huge upheaval, and some of this stuff must be considered in the context of the child and the way the child thinks of it in any event. But what we have attempted to do through this amendment bill is to ensure that our responsibility is very clearly fixed on addressing the monetary issues in these situations by ensuring that the most efficient and compliant child support system is available. That is exactly what it is supposed to do—to look after the child.

Under the proposed changes the government aims to improve the consistency of the service by granting the registrar the authority to delegate certain powers to individuals outside the Department of Human Services. This is new and it is substantial. The role of the external agency will be to become, effectively, the agency for debt collection. It will deal with the parents in ensuring that payments are made for child support. The focus of the Commonwealth and the focus of the parliament in this respect, then, will be clearly on the needs of the child. By allocating the role of debt collection agency to a third party, there is a greater opportunity to increase the identification and collection of outstanding child support debt. By conducting collection in this manner, we hope that we can benefit from external expertise and also see a significant reduction in the operation and costs in that regard. This will free up the existing Child Support Program staff to do what they are there to do—to focus on the child, to give better services to the customer and, in the main, to ensure that the child is being looked after appropriately under the system.

The structure of the system is based on the model that is currently being used by the department in Centrelink. For some time now they have outsourced their collection of outstanding liabilities. It could be seen, to some extent, as one step closer to integrating and streamlining government department agencies that have a community based support. Now, particularly where there is financial debt that one way or another has accumulated, that debt will be recovered externally and returned so it is not the child in this instance that is missing out.

The security of the parties involved will certainly not be compromised. The staff of external agencies, in terms of debt collection and what have you, will undergo the same security clearances as current employees of the Child Support Program and that, again, will also be subject to the current monitoring processes.

In addition to the external participation in the child support system, this amendment bill also addresses some criminal provisions in the process of an employer withholding payments, which currently is a little ambiguous, as I understand it. Not being a lawyer, I have not been able to appreciate the subtle differences that the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions has made, but I accept the advice that he has given—that is, 'employer withholdings' refer to the act by which an employer withholds specific amounts from a parent's wage or salary equal to the amount required by the Commonwealth support program. Under current legislation, according to the DPP, it appears that the employer can potentially be penalised for complying with the legislation. The uncertainty associated with the current wording outlined in the physical elements to the offence has now resulted in the Office of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions being reluctant to initiate prosecution proceedings in respect of an employer who fails to withhold such payments. The proposed changes will make it abundantly clear that an employer has a legal duty to deduct or remit child support payments and to send them to the Child Support Agency. It is made clear that an offence is committed when an employer fails to take these actions and that subsequent penalties will apply when these obligations are not met. Improving the efficiency and compliance within the child support system will ensure greater welfare for children of broken homes. I acknowledge that most parents pay child support in full and that they do it on time. As at 31 December 2010 over 77 per cent of all children in domestic activity cases received their full support payments. The government is proud of this record; the figure has steadily increased since 2007. In the last financial year $1.19 billion was collected. It is, however, our duty to ensure that the children who are subject to default payments are not left behind and are not neglected.

Regrettably, a large number of families and children in my electorate of Fowler are affected by any change that we enact to legislation in this area. As a parliament we need to ensure that these changes improve the system and make it easier for all stakeholders: the agencies involved, the parents, and most importantly the children who are affected. I have spent time with an organisation called Dads in Distress. I understand that many men are still grieving from broken relationships. When I met with them last month, I indicated that the position of government must always be with the child. We must ensure that the young person in the relationship—who had nothing to do with the break-up, who did not pick sides—is not left behind, that their financial wellbeing is looked after and that they are given the opportunity for inclusion in our modern society.

I commend this amendment bill. I strongly support the work done by Tanya Plibersek, the Minister for Human Services. She is a person who is very strongly focused in this area and she does know the value of looking after children.

Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak in support of the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011. I firmly believe that every child deserves to be emotionally and financially supported by both their parents. The importance of a culture where both parents provide the emotional and financial support for their children can never really be underestimated. Indeed, good parenting and adequate financial support is central to ensuring that children are able to reach their full potential.

Increasingly, research identifies the positive, life-enhancing health and wellbeing impact of being brought up in a family where the parents remain together to support one another and to support their children through all the challenges that life presents. Yet, as the member for Fowler, Government Whip, has so eloquently and personally articulated, the reality is that one-third of marriages break down, as do long-term relationships, and we are confronted with the reality that family relationships and breakdown are just a part of the way we live these days. One of the most contentious issues in relation to this bill is how the law deals with families where parents separate with regard to child support. Indeed, our system of child support is one of the means through which we ensure that children whose parents have separated receive the emotional and financial support they deserve. In a recent class that I had in a course entitled 'Issues in adolescent development', I had the benefit of having mature age students and young students who had just left school in the same classroom. One of the things I try to model in terms of excellence in education is to allow students as much space as possible to choose their own issues to explore. It just so happened that in this class I had a couple of young people who wanted to explore the impact of family breakdown on them and their peers who had experienced this loss and suffering. They went to great lengths to gather up-to-date information about how that impacts generally, and they were certainly very generous in sharing their own perspectives.

The interesting thing was that there were mature age adults in that classroom who had gone through family breakups and felt that they had managed them very well who were articulating that their children had suffered a lot less than was being articulated by the young students aged 17 or 18 telling the story of the difficulty of family breakdown. The conversation that came out of it was that so much of the depth of impact of a family breakdown depends on how the parents are able to interact and how safe the children feel after that period of intense difficulty. In our own conversations in that classroom, students were very easily able to articulate that, where parents were able to negotiate a practical way to manage their lives as they moved forward to becoming a family that had separated rather than living together in one house, the outcomes were so much better.

I want to put on the record too that, in addition to this conversation between younger and older members of my class, we got to really understand in a deeper way the whole theoretical concept of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. We do need food and we do need shelter. Yes, we need love. I would love to think that every day all Australians got to the peak of that pyramid and got up to self-actualisation. But the chances of achieving your maximum potential, the chances of becoming the best Australian that you can be, are severely compromised if at night you are struggling to have a full belly, a warm bed to sleep in or the love and care of two people who have a right and responsibility to be a part of your life in a sustained and important way.

That is why this bill becomes particularly important. As stated by the Minister for Human Services, who has just joined us, while most parents do the right thing and pay their child support in full and on time, sadly, we know that not all parents meet their child support obligations. There can be a range of reasons for this being the case currently. Sadly, in the media we see the terrible outcomes of acrimonious split-ups. Just recently there was a murder-suicide and the tragedy of that weighs on the entire community. At times of great sorrow and at times of great loss, people might not be able to make the best decisions but, while as adults we might have those impulses that take us away from the interests of children, the reality is that we also have deep and lifelong-lasting responsibilities as parents to ensure that the children we bring into the world are given every opportunity. In some ways, I think that becoming a parent is the moment where you have to learn that it is not all about you anymore. In that opportunity for growth, great things are possible. When the conflict of a family breakup happens, it is even more important that that discussion surfaces about who is at the centre of our considerations and that we make sure that, of all the people who are given the first and the most significant support, the children come first.

The means by which the Child Support Scheme is able to ensure that child support is paid therefore needs to be very effective. This bill is aimed at improving the effectiveness of the child support program with a register to ensure that parents comply with their responsibilities in supporting their children financially. The first means by which the bill does this is by enabling the Child Support Register to delegate certain powers and functions to individuals outside the Department of Human Services. Primarily, this will enable the Child Support Register to delegate its debt collection activities to external service providers who are specialised in debt collection. This method of delegation is currently utilised by Centrelink and it has been found to be effective. I understand that there could be hesitation in the community about enabling the Child Support Register to delegate its debt collection activities to external providers. But this outsourcing to skilled external providers does have the potential to lead to an increase in the successful identification and collection of outstanding child support debt. This therefore has the potential to ensure that more children have financial support that they deserve. I understand the great difficulties that parents who have separated face when they manage the parenting of children. Much of this is managed through parenting plans under the Family Law Act. However, as we know, child support can be a source of acrimony between separated parents. Indeed, issues regarding child support are often a barrier to constructive relationships between separated parents. This legislation puts the child's needs ahead of the parents and firmly recognises the benefits that children attain when they receive the financial support they need. By enabling the Child Support Register to delegate its debt collection activities to external service providers, the Child Support Program will be more efficient in managing other activities. These other activities are related to compliance and the more efficient and effective service of other child support customers.

In my previous occupation as a high school teacher, and then as an academic specialising in education, I came more and more to understand through my students the importance of a stable family life and ensuring good outcomes for children regardless of which parent they live with. It is simply critical that parents find a way to manage through this to enhance the outcomes for young people. By enabling the Child Support Program to be more efficient and effective, there is the potential that child support issues between separated parents can be better managed.

This legislation will also enable the Child Support Program to ensure the consistency of service delivery options. The delegation of collection activities will create the potential for the Child Support Program to lower its operational costs. This is important given the need to ensure that we effectively and carefully manage the resources of the Commonwealth. This bill will contribute to the development of greater efficiency in the Department of Human Services.

But there is a second part to the bill that is also important for us to explore and to put on the record today why it should proceed. This amendment bill also reforms the criminal provisions relating to the system of employers withholding a paying parent's salary or wages. The withheld salary or wages is paid to the Child Support Program to satisfy a child support liability. The criminal offences concern employers who do not abide by the system of withholding payments to the Child Support Program. The problem with the current criminal provisions is that they are ambiguous and therefore difficult to apply. Section 46 of the act as it currently stands does specifically outline the physical element of the offence. The issue is that the current provision only creates an obligation penalty. It does not specify whether the offence is created by an omission or an action. As stated by the minister, a literal reading of the current provisions suggests that an employer could be penalised for complying with this section. These issues have resulted in the office of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions advising the Child Support Program that it would be reluctant to prosecute an employer under section 46 of the act. This is an undesirable situation because it means there are real issues in regard to how this act is enforced. That is why this legislation is important. We are talking about a real issue with a real impact that is currently not enhancing the life outcomes of young Australians who are caught in the crossfire of difficult negotiations between parents over their responsibilities.

Issues with the effective enforcement of criminal sanctions lead to difficulties in ensuring that children receive the financial support they need through this Child Support Program. The new subsection 46(4A) for makes clear that an employer will be fined 10 penalty units if they fail to make a deduction that they have been required to do under the act. The new section makes clear that an offence is committed when an employer fails to take the required action. This same problem is found in sections 47, 59 and 72W of the act, and those provisions have likewise been amended to clarify that it is an 'omission' not an 'act' that attracts a criminal liability. By providing for a criminal sanction that is unambiguous the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions will be better able to prosecute employers who do not comply with the act; furthermore, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions will be more likely to be successful in such actions, ensuring that children do ultimately receive the financial support that they deserve.

We must also recognise that the criminal sanctions act as an important deterrent to employers with regard to noncompliance with their obligations under the employer-withholding process. If the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions experiences difficulty in enforcing the criminal provisions of the act, its ability to act as an effective deterrent is limited. Additionally, improving the ability of the Child Support Program to prosecute employers who fail to comply with requirements under the act will help the integrity of the Child Support Program. One wonders why it could be that an employer who is aware of such a situation acts in complicity with a non-paying parent. Relationships are interesting things in life—relationships between husbands and wives, men and women, mothers and fathers and employers and employees—and our loyalties are sometimes a little skewed in the wrong direction. This legislation is to make sure that children are put at the heart of any decision making and that they come before all else in order to give them the best advantage in getting on with life.

Population growth on the Central Coast has been among the many young families. We have a high percentage of families. The 2006 census gives a figure of 27,250 couple families with children under the age of 15 years who are dependent students. Additionally, there are 10,264 single-parent families with children under the age of 15 or with dependent students. It is really important to recognise that, in contemporary Australia, the composition of families varies, but we want to make sure that families that are not the typical, traditional family are not disadvantaged in any way and that their disadvantage is not made any worse by a failure to have the laws in place to support their best possibilities in life. Many Australian families, including families in my electorate, do experience parental separation.

I firmly believe that the amendments we have discussed here will advance the cause of ensuring that children are the priority in the child support system. They will provide for an effective incentive and, where necessary, a deterrent to employers to ensure that they comply with the act. I commend the amended bill to the House.

Craig Thomson (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is an unexpected pleasure, can I say, to speak to the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011. As my colleague, good friend and fellow Central Coast MP, the member for Robertson, has pointed out, this is a very important bill for our area. We are an area that has a lot of young families, a lot of families that have moved to the Central Coast, which will clearly benefit from this legislation. For that reason, it is an important piece of legislation for those of us who are from the Central Coast.

The bill proposes, firstly, to allow the Child Support Registrar to delegate certain powers and functions to individuals outside the Department of Human Services and, secondly, the bill amends several criminal penalty provisions to ensure that offences in those provisions can be prosecuted successfully. Successful prosecutions are difficult to obtain in relation to child support. This is a very important provision to make sure that these offences are prosecuted successfully so that the right outcomes are there. I think all MPs would have people come to their office with stories about particular hardships they have had to face and where essentially the issue has been about successfully prosecuting their case. This bill squarely faces that. More important is perhaps the philosophy behind this bill which is making sure that children are front and centre in terms of the decisions that are being made. All too often when we are in these difficult situations of assessing what is to happen, and how child support is to work and the like, these issues are not always front and centre. This is the case with this bill. While it was an unexpected pleasure to talk about this bill, it is nonetheless a contribution that I am very happy to make. I commend this bill to the House.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Child Support (Registration and Collection) Amendment Bill 2011 is very important legislation. I am very happy to speak on it, particularly with the Minister for Human Services here.

Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wouldn't miss it.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The bill has two major objectives. Firstly, the bill proposes to allow a child support registrar to delegate certain powers and functions to individuals outside the Department of Human Services and, secondly, as the minister has pointed out before, the bill amends several criminal penalty provisions to ensure that offences in these provisions can be prosecuted successfully—all very good aims.

The government believes it is vital that children of separated parents receive the emotional and financial support they need. Everybody would support that principle. While most parents do the right thing and pay their child support in full and on time, unfortunately not all parents meet their child support obligations. Through practical experience, the Child Support Program—and may I thank all those people that work in that area—very importantly has identified that having the ability to outsource debt collection activity to an external service provider on occasions should increase the successful collection of outstanding child support liabilities.

Hence the first amendment in the bill will enable a child support registrar to delegate certain powers and functions to external service providers. There is precedent, however, for this approach. For instance, such an approach is currently utilised by Centrelink for collection of outstanding liabilities. So why is the option being adopted? This approach aims to improve the collection of child support by using the expertise of skilled external providers for specific collection activities.

The outsourcing of collection activities is expected to lead to an increase in the successful identification and collection of outstanding child support debt. Indeed, this is right and proper. It is a debt. It is outstanding and there is an obligation on the debtor to pay. As a third party, it is the responsibility of our government to ensure that those responsible for child support payments honour that contract and obligation. There is another very good reason to have the option of outsourcing collection activities. This allows Child Support Program staff to concentrate on other compliance activities and better serve other child support customers.

The amendments to the delegation provisions under the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988 also have precedence. They are based on equivalent provisions under the Social Security (Administration) Act 1999 and the Paid Parental Leave Act 2010. As the Department of Human Services moves towards an integrated model between its various agencies, these amendments will enable the Child Support Program to ensure consistency of service delivery options across agencies.

The second group of amendments are for certain criminal provisions under the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988. These provisions relate to the obligations of an employer when they are required to withhold money from an employee. Employer withholding is a process whereby an employer withholds amounts from a paying parent's wage or salary only as required by the Child Support Program to be paid to the CSA in satisfaction of a child support liability. The current offences relating to an employer withholding in the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988 are deemed to be somewhat ambiguous. Hence it is argued that a literal reading of the provisions suggest that an employer could indeed be penalised for complying with the section. This makes it difficult for the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecution to prosecute an employer who is doing the wrong thing. The proposed amendments will make it clear that an offence is committed when an employer fails to take certain action. Obviously, to clarify this legal matter the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions has been consulted in the making of the proposed amendments. In summary, these amendments will improve the prospect of a successful prosecution under the act. They make it clear that it is an offence when an employer fails to deduct or remit child support payments for the benefit of children. Improving the ability of the Child Support Program to successfully prosecute employers who fail to comply with requirements will also help protect the integrity of the Child Support Program and, at the end of the day, support the children of separated parents. Is that not, after all, the very intention of the program? I commend the legislation and the minister for promoting it.

Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to thank all members for their contributions on this bill. It has been very reassuring and rewarding to listen to the contributions, because it has been plain from each contribution that each member considers that the best interests of the child should always be paramount when we are talking about issues relating to the Child Support Agency and the legislation which governs the actions of the Child Support Agency. Obviously, post separation after divorce is a period of enormous conflict and difficulty for families, and often there is ongoing conflict between parents. But, at every stage, as parliamentarians, as a community and as a country we should be thinking about what is best for the children in those circumstances.

I would like to make a few remarks about some of the issues that have been raised by my colleagues. The member for Menzies mentioned family relationship services. I want to reassure the member for Menzies that the government is fully committed to the Family Support Program and to funding services that help families to find alternative and meaningful ways of resolving their family law disputes. Total funding for the Family Support Program is well over $200 million per annum. That includes an annual investment of more than $90 million per annum for mediation services under the Family Support Program, which supports separating families to resolve issues around children's matters. Last year the government announced that some funding from within the Family Relationship Services Program would be redirected to provide legal assistance and advice to help separating families resolve disputes with targeted legal assistance delivered by organisations like community legal centres. That included reallocating $48.4 million from the Family Relationship Services Program over four years, with a total investment of $51.8 million, to help separating families resolve disputes with targeted legal assistance. Early indications show that this new approach to providing legal assistance for couples attending family relationship centres has been very positive. The government has consulted extensively within the family relationship services sector on these changes to their funding arrangements and, further, the government has decided to defer the measures that apply to family relationship centres until January 2012 to assist in transitioning to the new funding arrangements.

I also want to reassure the member for Murray about the difficulties that she raised in relation to grandparents caring full time for their grandchildren. She is absolutely right: it is a terrifically difficult thing, thinking you have raised your children, to then go back to packing school lunches, signing notes, taking kids for inoculations, going to weekend sport and helping with homework—starting all over again all of those responsibilities of day-to-day parenting. It is a very challenging role and can be quite overwhelming for many grandparents, which is in part because those grandparents do not always know about the supports that are available in the community to help them with the very important role that they have taken on.

On 8 December last year I announced that grandparent advisers will be introduced in some Centrelink offices to support grandparents. I have been fortunate enough to meet with one of the grandparent advisers in the Sydney region. The new advisers will provide one-on-one support to grandparent carers by helping them apply for government support such as family assistance and income support payments. They are doing a terrific job. The feedback on the grandparent support officers has been very positive as well. The government believes it is vital that the children of separated parents receive both the emotional and the financial support that they need from both of their parents. While, as other speakers have said, most parents do the right thing and pay their child support in full and on time, unfortunately not all parents meet their obligations, as other speakers have said.

The first of these amendments will firstly enable the Child Support Registrar to delegate powers and functions to external service providers. Secondly, the bill amends several criminal penalty provisions to ensure the offences in those provisions can be prosecuted successfully and, thirdly, the Child Support Program has identified that the outsourcing of debt collection activity on occasion should increase the successful collection of outstanding child support liabilities. This approach is currently used by Centrelink for the collection of outstanding liabilities. Even though the Child Support Program envisages only limited use of the new powers, they are necessary to strengthen the Child Support Program's focus on the collection of child support payments and debt reduction. The changes to the legislation will also enable the Child Support Program to use the expertise of external providers for specific collection activities; for example, there are times when you might need a forensic accountant to help for a short period of time. Now that the parliament has passed legislation to integrate Centrelink, Medicare and the Child Support Program into a single department of human services, it is appropriate for the Child Support Program to have the same powers as Centrelink so that a debt collection agent may concurrently pursue debts relating to mutual customers of the Child Support Program and Centrelink. The amendments in this bill will allow that to happen.

The second group of amendments relates to certain obligations on an employer to deduct and remit child support payments to the Child Support Program. As both the previous speakers have mentioned, the current offences, relating to employers withholding payments, are somewhat ambiguous and a literal reading of the provisions would mean that an employer could be penalised for actually complying with the section. That makes it very difficult to prosecute employers under those provisions. The proposed amendments will make it clear that it is an offence when an employer fails to take a certain action. That will improve the prospect of successful prosecution of employers who fail to deduct or remit child support payments for the benefit of children. Of course, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions has been consulted in the making of the proposed amendments. I commend the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ordered that this bill be reported to the House without amendment.

Proceedings suspended from 18 : 2 3 to 18 : 30