living and paying maintenance....

clearingout

but at what point are you satisfied that the balance between NRP, PWC and benefits/tax credits is 'correct'?

if a family with two working parents who between them earn only £20k can receive benefits, why shouldn't a working PWC? should the NRP contribute on top of that or not? where is the balance?

annie1975_2

What im saying is ,Yes a NRP should pay maintenece,whatever it is .Whether it be £50 a month or £500 a month.(a percentage of the wage)
The taxpayer should not be forking out hundreds of pounds to those kids upkeep,when the father is already paying.
If maintence is £200 a month, then £200 should be deducted from Tax credits. That way ALL one parent families are equal.

clearingout

but all families, one parent or otherwise, are not equal, are they?

annie1975_2

So you can have 2 identical families, and because one dad has gone AWOL. those children are worth less than the ones whos dads are paying..Where's the fairness in that?
TBH I think a woman working 16 hours a week and dragging Over £440 a week is an absolute disgrace.(when £208,plus housing benefit, and council tax benefit is being picked up by the tax payer)...

clearingout

annie1975 wrote: »

So you can have 2 identical families, and because one dad has gone AWOL. those children are worth less than the ones whos dads are paying..Where's the fairness in that?
TBH I think a woman working 16 hours a week and dragging Over £440 a week is an absolute disgrace.(when £208,plus housing benefit, and council tax benefit is being picked up by the tax payer)...

there's no fairness, though, is there, no matter which way you look at it?

Look at it this way (figures are for arguments sake, not meant to be totally realistic). Assume both PWC and NRP work full time.

Children A
PWC earns £10k
NRP earns £10k
NRP pays £1k in maintenance.
NRP gets topped up with working tax credit to basic standard for one adult.
PWC receives various benefits topping up to £25k aimed at supporting adult and children to include the maintenance. Would not be significantly better off whether maintenance is included as income or not (although better off, obviously).
If parents lived together, they would still be topped up to the £25k mark (as second adult doesn't get recognised by the system). Children marginally better off with parents separated - both parents likely to struggle at some level.

Children B
PWC earns £10k
NRP earns £60k
NRP pays £6k in maintenance.
PWC still topped up to £25k if all income is taken into account - just that £6k is from NRP and the rest is tax credits.
NRP still on a decent income, despite paying maintenance and would not receive any working tax credit. Children if parents hadn't separated would have lived in a household with an income of £70k. Children significantly worse off and at risk of seeing half siblings or step siblings growing up in considerably improved circumstances to theirs.

Children C
As B except maintenance is on top of tax credits. Children now living in a household valued £31k.

Children C see the benefit of their NRPs income. Children B don't.

In all circumstances, if either parent gets a new partner who works, tax credits likely to be reduced. Where Children B and C's PWC marries someone on a considerably higher income, their ability to support their own children is considerably reduced - we expect the new partner to pick up the tab. Or the PWC to earn more. If the NRP gets a new partner, that new partner has no responsibility towards the NRP's children although the NRP may have to take on their new partner's children. The calculations allow for this - consequently, maintenance into the PWC's household is reduced making them even more reliant on a new partner (if present).

Please don't get me wrong, I fully understand the argument for including maintenance as income for tax credit purposes and understand why many argue that it's not the tax payer's responsibility. As a PWC who pays tax, I personally prefer that maintenance isn't included - not just because my household income stands to benefit - but because I prefer to live in a society whereby we value children and attempt to give them as close as possible a standard of living to what they might have had had their parents not separated. This is something to be proud of, I think.

Bluemeanie_2

annie1975 wrote: »

You dont have to earn in excess of £50,000 for a decent standard of living. . Plenty of people manage on less than half of that.
And yes NRP should keep their children. But the taxpayer is picking up a big tab as well,and it shouldn't be.

This is my argument. If benefits etc are now capped at £26k, why should a two parent family be capped at this, but a single PWC gets this potentially plus maintenance. It is the people who chose to have the children responsibility to keep them or provide them with a better standard of living, not the tax payer. CO, I grasp your point with the examples you gave, but with that situation the parents are better off separated and we should not be encouraging this by giving people a better standard than if they are together.

Bluemeanie_2

annie1975 wrote: »

So you can have 2 identical families, and because one dad has gone AWOL. those children are worth less than the ones whos dads are paying..Where's the fairness in that?
TBH I think a woman working 16 hours a week and dragging Over £440 a week is an absolute disgrace.(when £208,plus housing benefit, and council tax benefit is being picked up by the tax payer)...

Agreed. It's about time this benefits culture is sorted out. I believe in benefits to an extent, but capped at 5 years. Until your first child has gone to School. Anyone can have one accident, or fall on hard times. 5 years is about 10% of your working life. And the CSA should have better enforcement to make non - compliant NRP's and be responsible for their own children.

clearingout

Bluemeanie wrote: »

This is my argument. If benefits etc are now capped at £26k, why should a two parent family be capped at this, but a single PWC gets this potentially plus maintenance. It is the people who chose to have the children responsibility to keep them or provide them with a better standard of living, not the tax payer. CO, I grasp your point with the examples you gave, but with that situation the parents are better off separated and we should not be encouraging this by giving people a better standard than if they are together.

yes, I understand this. I struggle to give any reasonable answer to the 'why should a two parent family be capped but a single PWC get the same plus maintenance'....other than the fact that the children should see the benefit of their NPR's income.

I don't like the we shouldn't be encouraging people being better off separated argument. That discounts the emotional, mental, financial....impact of a separation and assumes people do it on a whim. It also takes two people to make a relationship work and people shouldn't be penalised because things genuinely didn't work out or because one half of the couple couldn't be bothered to even try. We live in a civilised society, we don't see our people on the streets, scratching around for a living. We have low levels of crime generally and all benefit from living in such an environment. And I don't care if I am better off financially single than I am in a couple (and I wouldn't be personally) - my life with a partner was happier and easier than the one I lead now. Ditto the life of my children was far better as well - and that is something that the statistics also demonstrate. I don't think you can put a price on that - perhaps some do, but I don't buy it myself.

Bluemeanie_2

clearingout wrote: »

yes, I understand this. I struggle to give any reasonable answer to the 'why should a two parent family be capped but a single PWC get the same plus maintenance'....other than the fact that the children should see the benefit of their NPR's income.

I don't like the we shouldn't be encouraging people being better off separated argument. That discounts the emotional, mental, financial....impact of a separation and assumes people do it on a whim. It also takes two people to make a relationship work and people shouldn't be penalised because things genuinely didn't work out or because one half of the couple couldn't be bothered to even try. We live in a civilised society, we don't see our people on the streets, scratching around for a living. We have low levels of crime generally and all benefit from living in such an environment. And I don't care if I am better off financially single than I am in a couple (and I wouldn't be personally) - my life with a partner was happier and easier than the one I lead now. Ditto the life of my children was far better as well - and that is something that the statistics also demonstrate. I don't think you can put a price on that - perhaps some do, but I don't buy it myself.

The bit I have put in big is just something we will have to agree to disagree on! (which is fair enough) It cannot be fair that a two parent family is capped at £26k, but a PWC could receive £26k plus loads more in maintenance. It is not fair on the rest of society/tax payers. Especially when you take into account the NRP will also have to run another home, and if has the children for any significant overnight contact, it is more than likely they can even have a small one bed place to keep costs down. If they can deem two adults with 2 children can live off £26k, a single person with 2 kids is already technically better off as they have one less person to keep. It is an anomaly I really feel is wrong and does not balance the need of all members of society.
Off topic, I am not bashing just PWCs although it may sound like it, I don't agree with NRPs festering on benefits (or anyone for that matter) to evade paying for their children, or just to pay the £5 a week minimum. Ultimately my generally point is I feel people should be responsible for their own children, financially and emotionally, and a time limit put on benefits as not to encourage long term dependance. Maybe then we would see less children in homes, or poorly treated as I often see.

fannyanna

It makes a mockery out of the system when a means tested benefit ignores, what can be a substantial source of income (child maintenance)!