Address to the Men's Convoy on Child Support

Thank you for coming down here to let us know your concerns about Child Support. Let me acknowledge what a difficult area this is. As a father I can understand the bond you share with your children. Child support is an extremely difficult area. It deals with people under exceptionally hard circumstances and there are no easy answers to some of the problems that child support raises.

You've come here to share your concerns with us so I'm not going to do all the talking but I do want to take some time to outline some of the changes we're making to child support in the near future.

The Child Support Act was passed by the National Government in 1991 after significant of work was put into its development by the previous Labour government. So there is considerable support from both sides of the House for the underlying principles and approach of the bill. It doesn't mean the law will work perfectly for everyone and like most laws it needs tweaking from time to time, and we all have different ideas on what areas should be tweaked and how that should be done. The changes that this Government is proposing to make over the next year go to the heart of what child support is about: providing for the children

We want to address the mounting debt issue so that more people get into the system and more money gets to the children

On the other side of the ledger we're going to toughen up in some areas so that more money gets to the children.

Overall the package of changes aims to get more to children by ensuring that liable parents pay the child support they are assessed to pay. We are going to offer an incentive to those of you with child support debts. For the payment of your core debt we are proposing to write off a portion of the penalties that have accrued on the debt. This helps to get people back on track with their payments and helps to make sure that those who have taken a head in the sand approach to their mounting debt can get back into the system. The reason we're doing this is because we want the core debt paid because that is the money that flows to the custodial parents and the children. That is what this package of changes is all about.

Some people think we are soft on Dads. The opposition has accused you of 'fertilising, fleeing and forgetting'. To offer a balanced package we're going to toughen up in some areas for liable parents who don't take the opportunity we provide to get back on board. We're looking at ways to increase the collections the Australians make for us through our reciprocal agreement with Australia. The message is that fleeing the country won't be a way out. We want to make sure more liable parents in Australia meet their obligations to their children.

We're also looking at some changes around how we deal with liable parents with sizable debts looking to head overseas. People have been stopped at the border in the past and we're giving consideration to whether the threshold to trigger this should change.

We're looking at giving the Commissioner of Revenue more freedom to investigate a liable parent's financial situation if a parent's child support liability doesn't reflect someone's ability to pay. Say for example someone in business with strong cash flows but who pays him or herself a very low salary. So we want to crack down on avoidance to get more money to the children.

I am proposing a balanced package of reforms because I want to see more money flowing to the children who need it.

As I said at the beginning, I am here to listen to you and I am happy to get your views in writing so that I can give them thorough consideration.

Thank you.