Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Hansard source

I should add for clarification that I am reminded of the fact that a custodial parent’s income comes into the formula when it hits about $40,000, I think it is. So—in order to provide clarity—we still are not looking at that particular area, because it is not deemed to be the high-risk area at this stage. However, of course there will be another look at the application of the current formula once a custodial parent’s income exceeds $40,000.

In relation to the other matter, I would need to get advice. I am happy to provide an answer to the member for Prospect on the current number of CSA staff that focus on enforcement. I will add that we estimate that this year 40,000 non-custodial parents claimed to have no income and receive no welfare. They are the low-hanging fruit, if you like, that represent the people that will be targeted. I estimated on radio today that 90 to 95 per cent of those people were male. In fact, it is 88 or 89 per cent. Overwhelmingly, they are male—although not all are—thus the phrase ‘deadbeat dads’. I should emphasise that there are around 690,000 payers and, of the 690,000 payers, the high-risk ones represent between 40,000 and 70,000. The number referred to the Australian Taxation Office this coming year because they have failed to lodge tax returns might get up to about 100,000. That automatically raises a question about whether they are telling the truth about their income.

There is no joy in this for the government. I want to emphasise that. I get no great joy out of chasing people to pay their debts to their children. But it is a debt to their children. It is their flesh and blood, and they have an obligation to contribute to the cost of raising their own flesh and blood—their own children. There is nothing nice, successful or enjoyable about the breakdown of a relationship. The entire focus of what we do is on the welfare of the children. That is the clear intention of the child support act. That is the motivation for the activity of the Child Support Agency. It is a very tough issue. But, every time we undertake surveillance and every time we undertake court action, we do it on behalf of the children. We do not do it on behalf of an angry mother. We do not do it on behalf of an angry father. We do it on behalf of the children. That is our clear focus.

My advice is that this is the first time we have gone down a path of surveillance. It has been sporadic if it has been undertaken in the past, and this is the first time we have allocated significant resources. We have allocated $143 million over four years to better compliance. It is part of the Parkinson package. There will be arguments from both men and women that the new Parkinson formula either advantages them or disadvantages them. It seems as though this parliament can never get the formula exactly right, because of the over 800,000 cases that the CSA has. Every single case is different. There is different income to the household; there are different relationships, as a mother or a father might be repartnered; there are different custodial arrangements; there are different locations in Australia; and there are different pressure points on the financial arrangements. Therefore, it is extremely difficult to frame a formula that is going to satisfy everyone. It is very difficult. Inevitably, whenever the relationship breaks down, there are incredible emotions involved.

Again, I want to emphasise that what we are doing is targeting those people who are clearly trying to hide their income. There are people out there who try and do it, mainly through so-called self-employment. There are others who choose—I think rather unwisely—to park assets in the name of a new partner, which is courageous behaviour for individuals. If they are using legal structures to try and disguise assets then we will try to find out whether those legal avenues are in fact robust enough to withstand the scrutiny of the courts. We are also introducing a number of other measures, including a significant increase in the number of people who are stopped at airports from leaving the country if they have a debt to the Child Support Agency. I think that is a very powerful tool. We also have a very powerful tool in our referral of cases to the ATO for further investigation.

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