On 29 July 2004, the Prime Minister, the Hon. John Howard MP, announced the Government’s response to the Report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs on the Inquiry into Child Custody Arrangements in the Event of Family Separation.
1 One aspect of that response was to adopt the Report’s recommendation that the Government should establish a Taskforce to provide advice on whether particular changes to the Child Support Scheme are warranted.
The Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, the Hon. Larry Anthony MP, announced the establishment of the Taskforce and Reference Group on 16 August 2004. The Terms of Reference are given at the beginning of the Summary.
1.1 How the Taskforce conducted the Review
The main role of the Taskforce was to examine the formula used to calculate liabilities for child support and to consider a number of other issues arising out of the Government’s response to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs’ Report,
Every Picture Tells a Story (December 2003).
To fulfil this role, the Taskforce:
- analysed the submissions on child support made to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs in 2003;
- analysed issues raised in Ministerial correspondence and unsolicited submissions to the Taskforce;
- consulted the Reference Group on issues to consider;
- reviewed the research on the costs of children both in Australia and overseas;
- conducted new research on the costs of children using three different approaches;
- examined the current impact of the Scheme on the living standards of both resident and non-resident parents;
- examined the child support systems of other countries and in particular, new approaches to child support since Australia developed its Scheme;
- consulted overseas experts on child support;
- commissioned the Australian Institute of Family Studies to conduct a survey of community attitudes towards child support;
- considered the interaction of the Child Support Scheme with Family Tax Benefi t (FTB) and income support payments;
- consulted the Reference Group and other stakeholders on proposals for change;
- tested the proposals using a computer model that examined their impact for a range of different families; and
- consulted the Child Support Agency (CSA) on the feasibility of implementing the proposed new approach.
Papers containing the research underpinning the Taskforce’s findings are published in Volume 2 of this Report.
In analysing the costs of children, the Taskforce considered both the costs of children in intact families and the costs of children when parents live apart. Another major part of the work of the Taskforce required the analysis of the operation of the existing Child Support Scheme and proposed alternatives, and their interaction with the tax and income support systems. The National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling (NATSEM) at the University of Canberra was commissioned to develop a detailed model for this purpose. This was a complex task, but this microsimulation model and the extension of NATSEM’s population model (STINMOD) provide invaluable tools for future policy analysis and development. They enable the modelling of alternative policies to show outcomes for both individual families and the general population.
Submissions were not called for because all submissions presented to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs in 2003 were available to the Taskforce. The Taskforce considered any unsolicited letters sent to it by members of the public during the course of its work.
1.2 What was not in the Terms of Reference
It is important also to state what was not in the Terms of Reference. In submissions to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs, people raised a number of different concerns. Most of them were related to the operation of the formula. Others concerned aspects of the work of the CSA.
The Taskforce was not asked to examine issues concerning the administration of the Child Support Scheme. The CSA is now under the responsibility of the Minister for Human Services, the Hon. Joe Hockey MP.
The Taskforce was also not asked to consider aspects of the
Family Law Act 1975 concerning parenting after separation. Many people who made submissions to the Parliamentary Inquiry were concerned that the Government had an administrative system in place to enforce the payment of child support but did not do enough to ensure that non-resident parents could see their children when the courts had made orders providing for regular contact. This is a very important issue, but it is one being addressed by other reforms that the Government has announced in its response to the Report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs—in particular, changes to the Family Law Act, the establishment of Family Relationship Centres, and the expansion of the Contact Orders program across the country.
Issues concerning the Family Law Act, including the enforcement of contact orders, are a matter for the Attorney-General, the Hon. Phillip Ruddock MP, and are outside the Terms of Reference of this Taskforce.
1.3 The context of the Child Support Review—reforming the family law system
While the Taskforce has focussed upon the issues that it was asked by the Government to address, it has done so with an awareness of the other initiatives that are taking place to reform family law and to enhance the counselling and dispute resolution programs that support parents who do not live together because of relationship breakdown. The Child Support Scheme is only one part of a broader system to ensure that both parents share in the responsibility for their children after separation and help their children to achieve their full potential as the adults of the future.
2 In particular, the Taskforce and the Reference Group have been motivated by a concern for the best interests of children whose parents are not living together. Children need parents who will provide more than just financial support for them. Children generally do best after their parents’ separation if they have a mother and father who are both involved in their lives and who can cooperate together as parents even if they are unable to live together as partners.
Arguments about money, or concerns about the fairness of the Child Support Scheme, can get in the way of that cooperation. The overriding goal of this Review of the Scheme has been to ensure that, as far as possible, the Scheme promotes, rather than hinders, the meaningful involvement of both parents in their children’s lives unless this is contrary to their best interests.
1.4 Explanation of terminology
The terms ‘residence’ and ‘contact’ have been in use in family law since 1995 for orders in relation to parenting. The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs, in its report
Every Picture Tells a Story (December 2003), proposed a number of reforms to the
Family Law Act 1975, including replacing the language of residence and contact with family friendly terms such as ‘parenting time’ (Recommendation 4). It is anticipated that changes in terminology will result from the proposed reforms, to be given effect in a Bill not available at this time. In this Report, the Taskforce uses the existing terminology in the absence of any readily substituted terms.
In this Report, the term ‘resident parent’ is used to mean the parent with whom the child generally lives, and ‘non-resident parent’ is used to mean the parent who has periodic contact with the child. Where care is being shared more or less equally, the term ‘shared care’ is used. For the purposes of the recommendations of the Taskforce, ‘regular contact’ and ‘shared care’ are given precise definitions. These are explained in Chapter 9 of the Report.