Mr BILLSON(12.45 p.m.) —The Child Support Agency has at least 2,500 clients in the electorate of Dunkley, across all income ranges and family types. In every suburb throughout the electorate people are experiencing contact with the Child Support Agency. The marriage and relationship education courses in Frankston and other Peninsula locations are offering people improved encouragement so that they do not find themselves in the situation of having to separate from their children and from their partners, and basically to help them get on with the rest of their lives. The Child Support Agency is an important part of the institutional framework that seeks to ensure that the children of discontinued relationships continue to be cared for and develop with the support of both parents, where their parents move on to pursue separate lives.

What I like about this child support legislation is that it seeks to further humanise this institutional framework with changes that ensure that the legal and administrative arrangements can take account of real people's lives and their individual circumstances. The bill before this committee will not be the last word on changes to the child support scheme or family law. It is a partial response to some of the recommendations from the Joint Select Committee on Certain Family Law Issues, whose November 1994 report has been well documented. It is the same report that the predecessors, the former Labor government, found too difficult to deal with, but who are now very keen in chanting from their stalls what this government should do about it.

It is interesting to look at some of the remarks members opposite are making, and particularly the amendments offered by the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham). Again, there was very little in the way of constructive contribution to addressing these significant problems but more evidence that Labor is happy to sit back, chant from the sidelines, but leave it to the coalition parties to make some useful changes to this situation.

As a member elected in 1996, I am well aware that this inquiry received 6,197 submissions, the highest ever for any parliamentary committee in our country. I remind the House that non-custodial parents made 3,292 submissions, or 53 per cent of the submissions, and custodial parents 32 per cent. Further changes are required to respond fairly and effectively to the many issues raised during the inquiry and since then, and I am committed to pursuing them.

The Child Support Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 1) 1996 is a start. Today's bill addresses three areas. It aims to make income estimate elections notified by parents paying child support a more accurate reflection of their ability to pay. So when a payer's income drops more than 15 per cent, and they lodge an income election, their future liability will be reduced, rather than the complicated and annoying system that operates at present. This will lessen the chances of parents who receive child support already spending the money but not being aware that the paying parents income election has changed the amount of moneys effectively due.

Fewer payees will be required to repay overpaid amounts of child support, and payers who are unemployed for part of the year will not be required to pay child support. The child support system will be better able to accommodate changing circumstances of the non-custodial parents. As I was saying, this change will help to avoid the hardship created when the agency seeks to recover payments from custodial parents who may well have already spent the money on raising the children.

Secondly, the bill seeks to reduce the big brother nature of the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988 where it is unnecessary. The amendment allows child support payers with a good record to make payments directly to registrars rather than going through employers. Importantly, a person must have a good payment record before he or she can make payments in this way. If a default occurs, payers will not be able to remit moneys directly to the registrar for another six months. In the meantime, they will have to revert to garnishee orders through their employer as a penalty.

Finally, the Family Law Act is to be amended to enable people voluntarily paying child support to have that taken into account when the Family Court is making a property or spouse maintenance order. No longer will court orders fail to reflect the true circumstances of a person already paying child support. This measure will remove the current disincentive for parents of goodwill towards each other after a separation who have amicably entered into an arrangement for a child's care only to have these private arrangements ignored when the Family Court makes orders.

I support any measure that enhances the opportunity and likelihood for private and satisfactory agreements to be entered into. I endorse the comments of the Attorney-General who, in this House on December 4 1996, said:

Most people . . . would prefer to deal with the whole process of separation and associated agreements over children, property and maintenance outside the court environment.

As with most members, my office receives case after case of constituents' concerns regarding child support and family law. I would just like to compliment all the staff in electorate offices from all sides of the House who have to deal with these cases. They are often very emotional, very highly charged and very difficult to deal with, and I extend congratulations and best wishes to the staff of the Child Support Agency who I suspect experience similar exchanges with people involved with the system.

I want to point to a couple of examples. They highlight how the difficulty with the Child Support Agency is not typically skewed to one party, whether it is a matter of gender or custodial responsibilities. I have a constituent in Mornington who says it is all too easy for custodial parents to deny access, to make false accusations and have them acted upon through intervention orders.

My constituent says there is no accountability and there is no deterrent against vexatious accusations that are costly to defend. He asserts that people can perjure themselves in the Family Court with apparent immunity. If you do not have the means to be able to take that matter further, then simply your access to your family members is curtailed because of those accusations.

I have a female constituent in Karingal who has equally valid concerns. Her case is more complicated—it dates back almost a decade. Some ambiguous, badly drafted order from the Family Court has been interpreted by the Child Support Agency in such a way that she is now faced with having to refund over $3,000 of payments. I doubt, quite sincerely, that there has been an overpayment at all. It again shows the difficulty that many people experience with their interaction between the Family Court and the Child Support Agency.

When we turned to the Family Court for assistance it was unable to access any records to shed any light on this case. Now this person has the difficulty of not only raising the children but also having the fear of the $3,000 hanging over them, which the Child Support Agency asserts—and I greatly doubt—needs to be refunded. The performance of the Child Support Agency has improved; I will not go over that, but it is an encouraging sign.

This is the first step and there is more work to be done. I cannot see how people can expect to look for better behaviour from people who have gone through a difficult, emotional, and often very financially significant, experience such as a separation, if the system is not structured to encourage it. Far too many non-custodial parents come into my office, despairing at the difficulty they are having in re-establishing their lives. They have moved on to new relationships, they may even have new families, but because of some of the arrangements that are in place at present they find it very difficult to make a fresh start.

They point to the way that entitlements and payments are calculated and that the circumstances of the other former partner are not taken into account in the same way in which their own are. The capacity of both former parents to contribute to the raising of the child does not seem to be equally investigated. At the end of the day that is the key; it is what is in the best interests of the child.

Far too many people come into my office—excuse me if these terms are unparliamentary—and elect to take the `stuff it' option. It is just too much for them. They wonder why they are working very hard to try and re-establish their lives and to make an appropriate contribution to the care of children from former relationships, only to find that they just cannot make ends meet. One partner explained to me how, upon separation, all the family furniture and the family house was provided to the parent who was going to continue the primary custodial duty. That person tries to generate additional income through overtime so that the fruit boxes that are used as chairs in the lounge room can be replaced. But every time that extra effort is made, more of the resources go out of that person's pocket into the custodial person's pocket, in the non-custodial person's eyes without due cause. That person is saying, `Hang on, the capacity to raise the children is something that we share; it's a responsibility we both have to bear, and as our lives move on, surely the circumstances of both of the original parents should play a larger role in calculating the child support payments.'

I was somewhat disappointed that some very constructive measures that the subcommittee of government backbenchers put to the government were not incorporated in the budget. Some members on the other side might find that as an opportunity to have a go at us. But what I am suggesting to you is that work is going on; we understand that there are problems here. I also understand and accept the government's position that some well-intended, well-researched ideas do need to be carefully looked at by government.

But my message to the government is that we have not gone away, that those concerns remain, and our efforts to address them will continue. The great disappointment in the motion of the member for Werriwa and the contribution of the member for Hunter (Mr Fitzgibbon) is that they were simply carping away, saying there were issues that have not been resolved—that is right; we understand that—just as the more contentious recommendations in the joint standing committee's report were left on the shelf by the previous Labor government. There is no gain in their contributions. There are families out there battling to make ends meet and that contribution is absolutely useless to the task that is before us. I encourage all those members opposite who have a contribution to make, to make it in a positive way. These are real people's lives and they are doing it pretty hard out there.

In sticking with the theme of encouraging people to do the right thing, the member for Moreton (Mr Hardgrave) outlined, in his contribution, some of the ideas that we have been working through. These include: the way entitlements are calculated; how income is treated; what level of payment should be made once someone gets to 2½ times the average weekly earnings; how the custodial parents' circumstances change and how they should be addressed; the amount of exempt income so that people can get on with their lives; and the cost of raising children. If the task of raising the child is beyond the means of the two partners, we then have to look at whether our family payments system is supporting the raising of that child.

Payments for child support should represent one of the first obligations all non-custodial parents have. If, after making those payments, their circumstances leave them in such an impoverished state that they are not able to carry on with their own lives, and perhaps the raising of other children that have come about from a subsequent relationship, we should take that into account. That costs money. We have to argue our case well and we are endeavouring to do that. I respect the government's role in making sure we are not doing anything too hasty that is not going to improve the situation.

The issue about how reviews are conducted also troubles me. From the research I have done, the approach of the Child Support Agency seems to vary from state to state. I wonder whether it is not time to introduce the same sort of statement of principles you see operating in the Department of Veterans' Affairs so that all cases are dealt with equitably.

In a state such as mine, a review application for child support payments far too often sees arrears wiped off. The fact is that it is money that the custodial parents would and should have had in their pockets to help with the raising of the child but it is wiped off. I understand that there is a totally different practice in Queensland. That is unacceptable. They are all Australians. They are all facing similar dilemmas and they should all be treated reasonably equitably.

I also believe there is an argument that says the question of visitation to children should be linked with people's performance in honouring their child support obligations. For people who cannot see their way clear to honour those obligations, I think there is an argument that says that the benefits and the joy of being involved with the development of your child should be curtailed. People say that that is harsh and unfair but, at the end of the day, it is about making sure the resources are available for the education, learning, training, growth, feeding, clothing and housing of the young child. If people cannot see their way clear to honour those responsibilities, I wonder whether they should be able to have as active a part in the rearing of that child.

But there is a flip side to that for those non-custodial parents who are paying their way, and who find themselves in a situation where the custodial parent decides to move to Queensland with the child, which is often the case in the sunny Mornington Peninsula—sadly, some do not appreciate the beauty of our environment. I try to understand what it would be like if, heaven forbid, my relationship broke down and I was not able to have a role in the development of my child. I would consider that an enormous loss.

I would want the opportunity to make a contribution in the development of something that I have played a part in creating so that needs to be weighed into the equation. If that means that the cost of gaining access to the child has to be somehow reflected in the payments, so be it. If that means that the non-custodial parent has to look at those visitation rights, and if it means that the Family Court and the Child Support Agency have to consider how they can more effectively interact so that the two sets of issues mesh more comfortably, then we should also be looking at that. I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Main Committee adjourned at 1 p.m.