PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Children: Maintenance (16 January 2020)

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether her Department has plans to undertake a public consultation on changing the sequence by which deductions from benefits are ordered to ensure that child maintenance payments, if applicable, would always be one of the three possible third party deductions.

Asked by:
Karin Smyth (Labour)

The Department recognises the importance of Child Maintenance payments and these deductions are already prioritised above others such as legacy benefit overpayments of Housing Benefit, Tax Credit and DWP overpayments and Recoverable Hardship and Social Fund loans.

There are no plans to consult on the sequence by which deductions from benefits are ordered.

Answered by:
Mims Davies (Conservative)
22 January 2020