Child maintenance payments shouldn't be considered income, Cork councillor says

Cork County Council should disregard child maintenance payments from rent calculations and social housing assessments, a Social Democrat councillor told today’s meeting of the local authority in County Hall.

According to Isobel Towse, who represents the Social Democrats in West Cork, the average payment by one parent to another in the case of a split family is between €40 and €75 per week and in some cases is even less.

“Even if you take the higher of those averages, €75 per week, I can tell you as a single parent myself that it wouldn’t get you very far, any parent would tell you it wouldn’t get you very far, in terms of covering a child’s costs or contributing to them,” she said.

“The child maintenance I receive doesn’t cover two days of childcare and that’s not a reflection of my child’s father, he pays more than the average amount, in a way we’re co-parents. I pay the childminders so I receive the child maintenance.”

Ms Towse said that when the council is assessing someone for the housing list, this child maintenance payment is considered as income.

“It might be a small amount but it unfairly affects many single parents’ chances of receiving housing support and when the council is assessing the rent a single parent should pay, child maintenance is regarded as income, which is wrong.”

Ms Towse said it pushed many single parents over the threshold and made rent unaffordable. While her motion received support from colleagues, divisional manager Michael Lynch pointed out that the requirement to include child maintenance payments as “assessable income” was set out in the council’s rent scheme, and any change would require an amendment.

“There would appear to be some inequities in retaining maintenance payments as part of the calculation of weekly rent,” said Mr Lynch. He said the scheme would be reviewed at the next meeting of the Housing Special Purposes Committee, scheduled for the end of April.