Massive backlog of cases dogs Child Support Agency

Massive backlog of cases

dogs Child Support Agency

The controversial Child Support Agency has substantially improved its performance since its "difficult and unhappy birth", but still has a big backlog of cases to deal with, MPs said yesterday.

The role of the CSA is to take lone parents, predominantly mothers, off benefit by making absent parents pay maintenance for their offspring. But a report by the Social Security Select Committee showed that only about one-third of lone parents on Income Support and Family Credit had received a CSA assessment. Even this somewhat "flattered" the agency.

The total of lone parents on benefit - over 1.46 million in May 1996 - was a "snapshot" total, whereas the figure for the CSA caseload at the same point - 485,000 - was a "cumulative" total, including cases where absent parents were themselves getting benefit and were therefore readily accessible to the CSA.

But by the end of December last year, said the MPs, the number of maintenance applications on hand was 441,784, "which includes a considerable backlog compared to an estimated 200,000-250,000 applications on hand that the Agency would expect to have when at steady state".